{"id":1660,"date":"2010-03-21T16:04:15","date_gmt":"2010-03-21T21:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/?p=1660"},"modified":"2024-01-30T19:58:57","modified_gmt":"2024-01-31T00:58:57","slug":"a-great-deliverance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1660","title":{"rendered":"A Great Deliverance"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Great Deliverance<\/a><\/em> (1988) Elizabeth George<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>I’ve been out of sorts recently, and keep picking up books, reading a few pages, and then putting them back down, because they’re not what I’m in the mood for. Luckily (or perhaps unluckily) for me, Amazon provides endless recommendations, based upon other books you’ve read and enjoyed. <\/p>\n

Thus, I stumbled upon Elizabeth George.<\/p>\n

How had I missed reading her before? I have absolutely no idea. I’d heard the name, but somehow I’d managed never to come across her books. But this series fit right into the sweet spot of what I wanted–an established detective series that was highly rated, and had a good backlist, all of which tend to mean they’re more likely to be a good series (I know this is not a truth, those things do make it more likely).<\/p>\n

A somewhat ugly case is passed onto Superintendent Webberly’s, and between the serial killer he’s already dealing with, the political problems of the case at hand, and interpersonal issues with some of his staff members, it’s likely that nothing is going to turn out well for his department.<\/p>\n

And this is how Barbara Havers and Thomas Lindley end up going to Keldale to investigate a terrible murder.<\/p>\n

We are several chapters into the book before we even meet Havers and Lindley. First we see the priest bringing the facts of the case to Scotland Yard, then the Superintendent, trying to figure out what to do with the case. Considering that Havers has a history of being unable to work with other members of the CID, and her vocal dislike of Lindley, things don’t look particularly good for this case to be solved quickly and easily.<\/p>\n

And that doesn’t even go into the political considerations between the different police jurisdictions.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a teen girl is accused of the grisly murder of her father, and since the discovery of the body, she has said nothing other than, “I did it. I’m not sorry.”<\/p>\n

There is a lot going on in this book. We have the politics between the different departments, we have the tension between Havers and Lindley, we have Lindley’s personal life, Haver’s personal life, and Lindley’s best friend St. James is on his honeymoon, and the history between the two men is yet another mystery.<\/p>\n

Surprisingly, for me, the multiple threads worked very well. Part of it was because I knew why the man had been murdered, so that took a lot of the surprise out of the story. Would the resolution of that mystery been a surprise two decades ago when the book was written? Perhaps. <\/p>\n

Regardless, it didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book, as there were so many other mysteries going on.<\/p>\n

Now I’m looking forward to the next books in the series.
\nRating: 7\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Great Deliverance (1988) Elizabeth George I’ve been out of sorts recently, and keep picking up books, reading a few pages, and then putting them back down, because they’re not what I’m in the mood for. Luckily (or perhaps unluckily) for me, Amazon provides endless recommendations, based upon other books you’ve read and enjoyed. Thus, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[30,8,291,42],"tags":[730,371],"class_list":["post-1660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-british","category-mystery","category-paper","category-police","tag-1980s","tag-elizabeth-george"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/piQkW-qM","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1685,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1685","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":0},"title":"A Suitable Vengeance","author":"Michelle","date":"April 10, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"A Suitable Vengeance (1991) Elizabeth George Synopsis: Going backwards in time, we see the engagement of Lynley and Deborah, which we well know isn't going to last, and we meet other members of Lynley's family, including his mother and his brother, and spend time in the town where he grew\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/Suitable-Vengeance.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1697,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1697","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":1},"title":"Playing for the Ashes","author":"Michelle","date":"May 1, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Playing for the Ashes (1994) Elizabeth George Synopsis: Kenny Flemming is a brilliant cricket player who seemed to have come out of nowhere, and came to cricket not through the school system by through a factory league. Just before players are to be chosen for the Test matches, Kenny Flemming\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "British"","block_context":{"text":"British","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/british"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/Playing-Ashes.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":47,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/47","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":2},"title":"Legends II","author":"Michelle","date":"January 2, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Legends II (2004) edited by Robert Silverberg I picked up this book just for the Neil Gaiman Shadow story, so the fact that I found it in the bargain bin means that any stories beyond 'The Monarch of the Glen' were an added bonus. And 'Monarch of the Glen' was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Anthology"","block_context":{"text":"Anthology","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/anthology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2005\/01\/Legends.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1691,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1691","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":3},"title":"For the Sake of Elena","author":"Michelle","date":"April 24, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"For the Sake of Elena (1992) Elizabeth George Synopsis: Lynley is still keeping busy as things are still uneven between him and Helen, while Havers continues to struggle with finding care for her mother. When Lynley volunteers to take a case in Cambridge, both of their personal situations come to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "British"","block_context":{"text":"British","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/british"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/For-Sake-Elena.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5330,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5330","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":4},"title":"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo","author":"Michelle","date":"July 8, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2005\/2008) Stieg Larsson translated by Reg Keeland I read this the summer I broke my ankle. Because of that, much of my memory of it was fuzzy, both because I read a lot that summer and because I was taking a lot of pain\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mystery"","block_context":{"text":"Mystery","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/mystery"},"img":{"alt_text":"The-Girl-with-the-Dragon-Tattoo","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/The-Girl-with-the-Dragon-Tattoo.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1676,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1676","url_meta":{"origin":1660,"position":5},"title":"Well-Schooled in Murder","author":"Michelle","date":"April 4, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Well-Schooled in Murder (1990) Elizabeth George Synopsis: Thomas Lynley is called upon by an old schoolmate from Eton, when a boy at his school--a boy for whom he was ultimately responsible--is discovered to have been missing for the entire weekend. As Lynley is currently taking every case that comes across\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "British"","block_context":{"text":"British","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/british"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/Well-Schooled-Murder.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1660\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}