β Scribed by Nicci French
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Penzler Pick, August 2001: Already a sensation in England, Nicci French (the pseudonym of a London couple who've turned their marriage into a writing partnership as well) is quickly gaining recognition and fans on this side of the Atlantic, too. French's two previous novels published here, Killing Me Softly and Beneath the Skin, are romantic thrillers with hard edges--a little like a marriage of convenience between Sally Beauman and Ian Rankin.
But The Red Room is a change of pace that is reminiscent of Frances Fyfield, only without her stylistic quirks. It also asks a lot of the reader in imagining the deliberately obtuse or arrogant ways in which the police sometimes interfere in the lives of those not on the public payroll.
In this case, the two people whose lives are being most unfairly manipulated hold opposite, even antagonistic, places in society. One is a clinical psychologist, Katherine Quinn; the other, Michael Doll, is the troubled young man who not long ago left her with terrible facial disfigurement, having suddenly attacked her while undergoing an evaluation in his jail cell. Somehow, out of curiosity, misplaced duty, and a desire to try to "reduce him to his human size," Kit Quinn allows a police detective to talk her into seeing Michael once again. This time her nemesis--about whom she has recurring nightmares of a blood-spattered red room--stands accused of murder. The trouble is, after coming face to face with him, Dr. Quinn isn't at all convinced he's guilty.
Nicci French has better success with the setup of this suspenseful, twisty situation than she does with its resolution. But The Red Room provides superior entertainment, with a complex and all-too-human heroine at the center of its drama. --Otto Penzler
Following two highly praised psychothrillers (Killing Me Softly and Beneath the Skin), this fiction noir will be welcomed by French's avid readers. However, the fragmented, wandering at times almost directionless narrative won't do much to add to French's (actually a husband-and-wife writing team) list of fans. Attractive young London forensic psychiatrist Kit Quinn is having a run of rotten luck. First she catches her lover with another woman, then she's maimed by Michael Doll, a disturbed young man the police were questioning for loitering near an elementary school. When Doll is arrested again, suspected of murdering a young woman whose body is found by a canal where he fishes, Kit is asked to do a psychological assessment. Uncertain about Doll's guilt, Kit points out that the cops have no case. A tenuous connection to Will Pavic, the director of the homeless shelter frequented by runaway teens in a seedy ghetto, leads nowhere. Over protests from the smug police that she is wasting her time, Kit, following her intuition, wanders far afield and questions the affluent family of a young mother, the victim of an earlier, seemingly unrelated kidnapping and murder. Also, she intuits a link with the suicide of a troubled teen. Ignoring her fear that he may be involved, Kit, out of loneliness, enters a bittersweet affair with Will. Despite a literary yard sale of gratuitous characters, superfluous subplots and prose that at times seems remote and abstract, the chimerical plot is rescued as the signature climax is delivered right on cue. Major ad/promo. (Aug. 7)starring Heather Graham and Joseph Fiennes, this October.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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