Unnatural Ends - Book Review

 

Unnatural Ends
 
3.8 stars
Pub Date Jan 2023
 
1903 – A tower named Camelot, a play place for three adopted siblings.
 
‘I knew a man who began by worshipping 
with others before the altar, 
but who grew fond of high and lonely places
 to pray from…’ GK Chesteron
 
This quote alone sets the stage for the death of Sir Lawrence Linwood (1921) and the return of his three children to solve what turns out to be a murder and resolve their upbringing.

Filled with plot twists and surprises it is a who-done-it that kept me engaged till the final pages. The descriptions of Alan, Roger and Caroline were detailed and vivid enough that you felt that you knew them, but each as well had their hidden sides. They were of course raised by Linwood and their mother, Rebecca. So you would expect nothing less in their complexity.

A telling of a less than ideal family, about manipulation, deceipt, mores of the times, and uncensored ego.

I recommend this book as a quick read, filled with interesting characters, but do pay attention to the quotes that front the chapters, they are gold. I had to go back and re-read them because they were rich in meaning once you were finished the book.

So many words that foretold what was to come:
  • the funeral was so unlike father it lacked that certain vitality that came with honest simplicity
  • he'd fall apart like a house of cards, because no one was even really that much of a stoic without something montrous at his heart
My favourite lines: “Alan had an idea that Father’s atheism had more to do with pride, an unwillingness to place any being higher than himself, than with any real theological conviction.”

My thanks to #NetGalley and #Inkshares for this early copy and my unbiased review. 
 
Next up, The Book of Lost Names, Kristin Harmel.
 

 

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