Book Review Thursday - 2/21

I am still chugging away on the Fatal Winter by G. M. Malliet and I am just over halfway through now. I finished a book on my iPod and started The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum and I am enjoying it. I am listening to it at 1.2X speed and it is moving along well. Quite a bit different than the movie, but that always happens, right? I have never actually seen the entire movie all the way through so I am not sure what is different, but I am enjoying the book.

This week, I read The Birthday Present by Barbara Vine. The story is told from 2 points of view - Rob and Jane. Rob is sharing the story of his brother-in-law Ivor's affair with Hebe Furnal and Jane is sharing the story of her best friend Hebe Furnal's story of the affair.

At the beginning of the book, there is a lot of background on Ivor and talk of a birthday present that Ivor is putting together for Hebe. Almost to the middle of the book, you find out that the birthday present went terribly wrong. And the rest of the book is the fallout from the events surrounding the birthday present and you hear from both sides of the affair courtesy of Rob and Jane.

If you have never read a Barbara Vine story, you wouldn't know that there is a dark and twisted side to every one of her novels. This novel is no exception. There is a lot of talk of British politics in the 1990's because Ivor is a member of the parliament. How he passes the scrutiny of the British papers while carrying on with a married woman is something that I didn't understand.

If you enjoy the dark and twisted novels, this book might be a good option for you. While I don't think it is not one of the better Vine novels, it was a nice read.