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Synopsis
'A compulsive read...One of the most quietly impassioned thrillers of the year.' THE MAIL ON SUNDAY (LONDON) Laura Principal is repelled but fascinated as she investigates the case of an eleven-year-old boy who has murdered his foster mother. It is not the sort of crime one would expect in Cambridge. The child, Daryll, has confessed to the brutal killing; now his elder brother wants to find out what has turned him into a ruthless killer. Laura confronts an investigation which is increasingly tainted with violence. And that's not all. Someone with an interest in the foster mother's murder is standing in the shadows, watching her every move...
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Review
In Standing in the Shadows, Michelle Spring's third novel about Laura Principal, Cambridge-based private eye, the detective investigates the brutal murder of a widow at the hands of her 11-year old foster child. Daryll Flatt was convicted of crushing Geraldine King's skull with a barrage of rocks and concrete blocks. As a police detective on the case puts it, "This was a Chicken Little kind of death. The sky fell in." Two years after the murder, Daryll's older brother hires Principal to learn more about why he did it. As she interviews the boy's neighbors, social workers, and relatives about his character, Principal begins to notice that a) most people thought the boy was hyperactive and disturbed but not homicidal, and b) the men she talks with liked the widow, but the women generally did not. Along the way, Principal learns more than she wanted to know about the messy lives of the well-kept denizens of Cambridge. She meets nosy, vitriolic neighbors, men who are unkind to their wives, and a fellow in a gorilla suit who exposes himself to young children. And yes, she begins to get the distinct feeling that she is being followed.
The story is an engrossing one, and Laura Principal is good company. She's a thoughtful, observant narrator who has entertaining friends and coworkers. There's not much action in this book, but there is plenty of suspense, thanks to the odd assortment of characters Spring has created. Initially, none of these characters appear to be particularly suspicious (except the man in the ape outfit), but most of them have done something horribly wrong. Principal doesn't want to believe that a little boy could murder a nice old lady. She can't understand why people are so awful to one another. She keeps asking herself, Why would a person hurt another person like that? That's a pretty compelling question. -Jill Marquis
From the Publisher
My mom is not an avid reader (although she did take the photograph of my nephew that appears on the cover of the new TODDLER TAMING). Being a proud mom she wants a copy of every hardcover I design, so I sent her a copy of Michelle Spring's STANDING IN THE SHADOWS recently. Regardless of what the book is, or how interested she is in it, it usually takes her a very long time to finish a book. Well, she finished reading STANDING IN THE SHADOWS in record time, loving it from beginning to end--it's obviously a page-turner.
--Cathy Colbert, Graphic Designer
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