Didn't like the writing style. ( )

Sarah Fortune is a lawyer with a complex past who is sent to Norfolk to sort out a family inheritance. Fyfield tells a good story although I found Fortune's character a bit unbelievable given her professional role.

Summary (from the blurb): When Sarah Fortune, with her impeccable qualifications and chequered history, is sent to a small seaside town in Norfolk, she goes willingly. Sorting out the inheritance problems of the Pardoes, Merton-on-Sea’s premier family, promises to distance her from a claustrophobic relationship with Malcolm Cook. Sarah cannot bear to be a captive. But she soon discovers that guilt, insecurity, unrequited love and a touch of insanity afflict the Pardoes and the town, the legacy of a suicide that took place two years before, when Elizabeth Tysall, a beautiful woman with an uncanny resemblance to Sarah herself, walked into the sea and never came back...

I really don’t know what to make of this one. I don’t have a good history with Fyfield, having abandoned A Clear Conscience for lack of plot or character development.

On the one hand, I had no trouble picking this up again and again and finishing it. There was a good range of characters, all were flawed, so far so good. I loved the character of Mouse Pardoe, quietly insane and loving every minute of it. Sarah turned out to be bizarrely promiscuous (I say bizarrely because it really jumps out of nowhere, there is no reason for it, and it’s brushed off as “she used to be a call girl”), but apart from that was a pleasant and clever protagonist. Most of the rest of them are just a bit strange and undercooked. Whether the intention was to convey the isolation of a seaside village in Norfolk or not, it doesn’t really work. The characters cycled through their emotions very quickly and a little abruptly for my taste.

The setting was beautifully described and constantly evoked, there’s always the sound of waves or seagulls or strong wind off the North Sea, which made up for some of the character weaknesses in keeping a strong background.

In terms of plot, we switch between Sarah’s efforts in Merton-on-Sea and sub-plots including her relationship with Malcolm (who dwindles into such insignificance for the middle half of the book that I was very surprised when he came back later!), her recent history in which she was attacked, and her potential connection to Elizabeth Tysall. I felt that the construct of Malcolm and his family around the main plot was fairly superfluous, but the connection to Elizabeth was an interesting (and chilling) thread to have running through the book.

Readable, but the character development was pretty weak. ( )

Set in Merton, England, this is a very atmospheric, creepy tale of obsession, greed and family. Fyfield has two very different but strong female characters: Sarah Fortune and Mouse Pardoe. Sarah is sent to Merton to sort out problems with the will of Mouse's late husband. There is plenty of evil in Merton and Fyfield does a great job of weaving a tangled web of deceptions and creating memorable characters, another gem, the boy Stonewall. ( )

Sarah Fortune goes to a small seaside town in Norfolk to straighten out inheritance issues for the Pardoe family. Three siblings and an apparently demented mother own most of Merton-on-Sea. For Sarah the job offers the opportunity to get away for a little time at least from a claustrophobic relationship with her boss's step-son. The inheritance issue isn't all that needs straightening out and tidying up. The town has its own secrets: the death by drowning two years before of a woman who bore an uncanny resemblance to Sarah and an elderly thief with a thatch of white hair whom everyone refers to as "the ghost".

This isn't simple crime fiction. Frances Fyfield brings to her story telling an embellished literary style that demands that the reader see the world through the eyes of the main characters. This will undoubtedly mean that many readers will find it heavy going. You get the impression of a carefully crafted story, when the language is every bit as important as the action.

Sarah Fortune herself is a real conundrum: "perfectly pure and good", she at times uses her own body to bring solace to men whom she likes. She does not see this as amoral behaviour, even though the reader might. ( )