A Traitor to Memory Book

In A Traitor to Memory, Elizabeth George proves that she belongs firmly in the upper echelons of crime writers. Her 10 previous novels of psychological suspense have carefully consolidated the character of her aristocratic detective Thomas Lynley, and with this book she creates for him a narrative more tangled and (seemingly) impenetrable than ever before. Gideon Davies is a classical violinist who has lost his ability to play. In the middle of a Beethoven trio, his mind has been wiped clear of everything related to music. But what he can remember is the weeping of a woman and a single name: Sonia. Davies is soon involved with the death of a young woman called Eugenie, who is run down by a car in the streets of London. On the track of her killer, Lynley and his associates Barbara Ramiz and Winston Nkata become aware of a connection with the violinist and a mysterious group of people somehow linked with a crime and its consequences that took place over 20 years ago. As always, George is faithful to the demands of the classical detective narrative, and the reader is challenged by the slowly unfolding revelations just as much as her struggling protagonists. But, unlike so many of her contemporaries, George never forgets that the sense of place is quite as intrinsic to a mystery story as any whodunit elements, and the panoply of England unfolded before us here is richly and vividly realised. In earlier books, Lynley has seemed almost preternaturally gifted, but here his desperate attempts to penetrate the dark secret have much more of the quality of a struggle - and perhaps this is why A Traitor to Memory is possibly the most satisfying outing for George's detective yet. --Barry ForshawRead More