Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...
 won't be reading another! August 7, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
i read 'the various haunts of men' and thought it was ok if a bit meandering. I hadn't read the second book in the series but that didn't really matter. Yes, it was well written and quite a 'page-turner' but ultimately disappointing. The amazing 'twist' is revealed early on, leaving you thinking 'is that it'? The child abductor is caught completely by chance, with no detection work involved at all: 'look, there's a car that fits the description, let's chase it!!'. I fail to see how the story of Lizzie and Max Jameson is in any way relevant to the plot; he isn't even tied up to the crime he commits at the end. Once again, all the female characters are intensely annoying, either too-good-to-be-true GP, 'crisis-of-faith' priest, or 'cheap and nasty' single mother. I really would expect more from a female writer.
Unsatisfying. June 9, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
All was going well with this book for some time. The characters are obvious stereotypes, but I quite warmed to them and their storylines and found the crime storyline interesting and a page turner.
It all fell apart for me because I kept waiting for an amazing twist that never happened (this must have been the small twist near the beginning of the book which, while cleverly done, wasn't the genius that I was expecting, so I assumed that there must be a better one coming towards the end to justify the hype. There wasn't). The book isn't given a proper ending and I was really hoping that all the various characters and storylines would end up intertwining, but no, this didn't happen either. I was left feeling cheated, as if I'd wasted my time on a 'story that never was'. A shame because it started promisingly and I really wanted to know more.
 disconnected January 23, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I am pretty new to the genre of crime fiction, but it seems reasonable to expect a certain amount of suspense and a certain degree of plot - but this curious book has neither. Perhaps it is because I have read it out of sequence, or that i expected the arrest of Ed to lead to some sort of closure when in effect it is embedded in a random set of story lines that never really meet - even the cave scene presents no denouement, a rather pointless read, a bit like chewing gum. The characters and the setting arte Christie esque and deeply unconvincing.
 not a crime novel December 25, 2007
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
like the two previous Serrailler novels,if you don't expect a crime novel, and can cope with a 'rosy, middle England', middle class view of the world, this is a good book. Hill is a great writer, better than most crime writers, but not, on the evidence so far, a good crime writer. As a novel of a family and those they meet, and deal with it is very enjoyable. After the initial disapointment, the series grows on you once you accept it for what it is, and what it is not
 A vision of society gone awry December 17, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book could almost be classed in the dystopian novel genre. Hill depicts a society in which violence, whether random or targetted, is everywhere, as civilisation, even in the heart of an English cathedral city, crumbles.
I agree that it can't really be called a crime novel. The story follows on immediately from the Pure in Heart, but the child-abductor of that novel is arrested at the beginning and the story meanders off in different directions: a man literally driven mad with grief by his wife's death; a young clergywoman struggling to realise that she's taken the wrong job and having to cope with murder in the family. As before, loose ends are left and who knows if they'll ever be knitted up?
Hill has a habit of beginning a new chapter talking about 'He' or 'She' and not letting on who the character is for a couple of paragraphs. I found this irritating, as if she was just playing guessing games with me. Such tricks are best deployed to some purpose: when the reader is to be misled over the identity of the character who has taken central stage.
I also struggle with the character of Simon Serailler and find it hard to care what happens to him, which is a major flaw. Cold fish is putting it mildly. The way he treats his ex-girlfriend is unforgiveable. Given the warmth of his twin sister, there seems no real explanation for how he is. There are some good major characters but minor ones often seem underwritten.
That said, I kept turning the pages.
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