The Outcast Dead, Elly Griffiths
Feb. 13th, 2014 03:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
callmemadam
This book was recommended by Geranium Cat so I requested it from NetGalley and was lucky enough to get it. I’m so glad, because this is the first book by Elly Griffiths I’ve read and I was very impressed, even though it’s written in the present tense, which usually irritates me.
I love the title of this book and what it stands for: a prayer for the unknown dead buried in plague pits and paupers’ graves. Ruth Galloway is a forensic archaeologist, currently excavating what may be the grave of a notorious Victorian childminder and child killer, known as Mother Hook. To Ruth’s embarrassment, the work at the dig is being filmed for TV. At the same time there are two abductions of babies, both in the care of childminders, plus a possible baby murder, in the Norwich area. Ruth is involved because one of the babies is the child of a friend and the investigating officer is the father of her own baby daughter. To complicate matters, she’s attracted to Frank, an American historian working on the film. There’s nothing like a hunt for a missing child to create tension and the book builds towards a nail biting finish. The story of Mother Hook is linked to the present day events, which adds to the interest.
The book seems to be about real people in the real modern world, with all its complicated relationships. I believed in the characters and sympathised with them. I really liked all the up to date details about what children watch on television and adults listen to on the radio (many’s the time I have found Today in Parliament a soothing aid to sleep); this is a recognisable world of normal life interrupted by horrors. Now that I’ve read this, I’ll certainly be looking out for the five previous books about Ruth Galloway. If they’re all as well written as this one, I’m in for a treat.
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no subject
Date: 2014-02-13 05:56 pm (UTC)Hope you are well, I do still read your blog but have difficulty commenting. Hope this works.
Very Best Wishes
Oddny
no subject
Date: 2014-02-13 07:06 pm (UTC)I hope our library will have some Elly Griffiths. The nearest, small one, is now a 'community library', i.e. run by volunteers. Who'd be a trained librarian?
Thanks for the good wishes, which are reciprocated!
no subject
Date: 2014-02-13 10:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 07:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 08:17 am (UTC)Happy birthday, young lady!
no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 09:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 02:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 07:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 10:37 am (UTC)And thank you, very humbly, for pointing out my utterly appalling mistake on my post about Martyr - I'm sure that was entirely me, and my brain was obviously elsewhere when I wrote it. Hideously embarrassing! But I'd been correcting other people's bibliographies all day and I was feeling a bit grey round the edges.
no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 10:46 am (UTC)Sorry, I thought the error was the author's! Easily done when you're tired. I still don't think that book is for me.
The Outcast Dead
Date: 2014-02-14 01:44 pm (UTC)Re: The Outcast Dead
Date: 2014-02-14 03:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 05:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-14 06:25 pm (UTC)