A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is my first experience with Elizabeth George and I was duly impressed with her ability to craft a fine mystery. I especially admired the believable way in which she delves deeply into her characters’ psyches. An omniscient third is not always that omniscient and I found the individuals on stage here quite fascinating. With A Great Deliverance, we meet Inspector Lynley and I found him to be a man of intelligence, pain, and a deep sense of compassion which was quite touching and affecting.
“He had never thought of himself as much of a praying man, but as he sat in the car in the growing darkness and the minutes passed, he knew what it was to pray. It was to will goodness out of evil, hope out of despair, life out of death. It was to will dreams into existence and spectres into reality. It was to will an end to anguish and a beginning to joy.”
And, how drawn I was to his responses to the trenchant and seemingly mean-spirited Sergeant Barbara Havers! Most people, I believe, myself probably included, when faced with a person filled with malevolent preconceived notions, largely centered around the differences amongst the classes, would rise in anger to be falsely-identified, to be accused of superciliousness, and to be treated as though one cared not a whit about others simply because of one’s aristocratic lot in life. If not anger, I believe a cry of dissent and a defense of character would at the very least be rallied. But, Inspector Lynley (and this is quite possibly the reason I’ve already developed a huge crush on him) did nothing to defend himself against the false accusations of Sergeant Havers. Instead, especially toward the end of the book, his attitude of grace and care toward her brought me to tears.
There are 19 books in the Lynley series so far and I shall look forward to reading them all!
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