The only certainty is that The Widow is a compulsory listening experience. Those who appreciate a lower-key exercise in keeping possibilities open while continually providing more information will enjoy this emotionally resonant work by a longtime British crime reporter turned first-time novelist.Īnne Payne organizes the Jax Freestyle Book Club for Real Readers at ’s difficult to name the better storyteller: the sensational author Fiona Barton, or reader Clare Corbett, who gives a one-woman, full cast performance. Readers craving a roller coaster should choose a different book. Unlike some other recent suspense novels built around female characters and using elaborate narrative devices, 'The Widow' keeps the overall plot in the realm of the believable. Like other contemporary entries in the suspense and thriller categories, 'The Widow' manipulates point of view and timeline to amplify reader curiosity and keep the next turn unpredictable. The idea of violence toward a small child is inherently upsetting, and indeed that is where the book derives much of its emotional power, but 'The Widow' is not graphic or grisly. 'The Widow' is a deft 50-50 mix of the police procedural and psychological suspense novel. Waters is quick-witted and resourceful, not unkind but slightly ruthless in pursuit of a splashy story. Approaching retirement, he feels outshone by younger and better-educated colleagues. Sparkes, true to fictional type, is methodical and dedicated. Her voice shares the book in more or less rotating chapters with the third-person storytelling from the respective points of view of two seasoned professionals in the crime business, Detective Inspector Bob Sparkes and tabloid reporter Kate Waters. In Fiona Barton's 'The Widow,' Jean's opaque point of view (Is she as naive and mentally dormant as she makes out? Is she intentionally hiding information, lacking insight, neither or both?) is presented in first-person narrative. When he fell fatally into the path of a bus, Glen had already spent years as the high-profile prime suspect in the abduction and presumed murder of 2-year-old Bella Elliot, whose disappearance has been a television and tabloid staple. At the time of her husband's death, she is a fortyish hairstylist in London's south suburbs, married since she was 19 to the late and unlamented Glen.

The widow barton