Summertime - Hardcover

Rigbey, Liz

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0399150943 ISBN 13: 9780399150944

Publisher: Putnam Adult, 2003

Synopsis

Her carefully constructed life falling to pieces upon the murder of her father, Lucy Schaffer is forced to delve into her painful past, which has been overshadowed by her mother's insanity, her brother's drowning, and the loss of her own son.

About this title

About the Author

Liz Rigbey has been a scriptwriter for BBC TV and radio and a consultant to international aid projects in Russia, Kenya, and Afghanistan. Her first novel, Total Eclipse, was published in more than a dozen countries.

Reviews

Eight years after her well-received debut, Total Eclipse, Rigbey returns with another psychological suspense novel, ambitiously conceived but frustratingly disjointed. Overpopulated and overly complicated, the murky plot advances in fits and starts. The pacing is disrupted by frequent flashbacks to the lives of the various members of two generations of the family of a former Russian KGB agent who defected with his wife and three daughters to California-and families of their friends and neighbors as well. Narrated as the first-person account of the granddaughter of the Russian defector, ambitious young investment banker Lucy Schaffer, the story opens three years after Lucy has abandoned her husband and family and fled to New York to forget the tragic death of her infant son. Called home to California when her father's corpse is pulled from the Pacific, Lucy is told that he may have been murdered. She is delegated the responsibility of tying up the loose ends of the estate, and she also takes on the task of investigating the mystifying circumstances surrounding her father's strange peregrinations on the day of his death. Meanwhile, she is forced to confront repressed memories of growing up as the younger daughter of a schizophrenic mother and a father raised by religious zealots. Rigbey's prose is smooth, but even those patient enough to endure the novel's blind alleys and red herrings will be frustrated by the contrived twists at the end.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

*Starred Review* Three years ago, Californian Lucy Shaffer fled to New York after the SIDS death of her baby son. She hasn't been back to California since. Then she receives a call saying her father has died. Deeply upset and feeling guilty, Lucy flies home only to learn that the police think her father was murdered. As Lucy tries to make sense of the tragedy, clouded memories of the past she has tried to forget return to haunt her: the inexplicable madness of her Russian-born mother; the mysterious drowning death of her infant brother; a nightmarish family outing to Arizona; the shocking death of a childhood friend. As the painful memories emerge, Lucy begins to suspect a horrifying truth: what she has believed about her family is a melange of half-truth, myth, and outright sham. She solves her father's murder but discovers a reality that is dangerous and terribly dark. This multifaceted novel combines a gripping murder mystery; a moving tale of love, loss, and redemption; the powerful saga of a family haunted by tragedy; and the bleak drama of one woman's agonizing confrontation with her past. The only flaw is the British Rigbey's annoying overuse of sure and real to show her grasp of American speech patterns. That aside, this is a well-nigh perfect crime novel. Emily Melton
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Putnam Adult
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0399150943
• ISBN 13: 9780399150944
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384