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Ellie Foreman, a film producer and single mother in a suburb of Chicago receives a letter from the landlady of an elderly man who has just died. The man, Ben Sinclair, has Ellie's name written on a piece of paper. Ellie doesn't know the man but is curious and goes round to his apartment. They find some photos and an old lighter and a box they can't open. Seemingly at a dead end, Ellie is coerced into disposing of Sinclair's personal effects to the local charity shop. When Ellie finds the shop closed she returns to the boarding house and finds that the landlady has died, seemingly of natural causes. Ellie takes Sinclair's belongings home and leaves them in the basement. Shortly after, she's burgled and Sinclair's effects are taken. Ellie doesn't realise the death and the theft are linked. Meanwhile she has managed to make contact with a man who Sinclair was corresponding with, David Linden, an attractive banker. David is an orphan and was hoping for information from Sinclair on his mother, his father Kurt having died before he was born. Ellie's ex-husband disappears leaving behind hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of debt on a joint account which should have been closed at the time of their divorce, leaving Ellie with the worry of being liable for some of the debt. Short of money, Ellie is forced to work for a local politician, Marian Iverson. At Marian's offices she sees a photo of Marian's dad, Paul. The photo is the spitting image of David. Ellie continues to investigate the past whilst trying not to reveal to David, the truth of his parentage. This is a difficult book to summarise or categorise with a complicated plot involving events from WW2, modern day crimes and a romance. The above paragraphs are but a taster. The author draws the threads together well and though I can see Ellie's reasoning not to go to the police sooner I think she puts herself unnecessarily in danger at the end. The WW2 events are fascinating and believable and I also enjoyed the snippets about Ellie's profession. Though it involves an amateur sleuth, it's not really a cozy. Amazingly, this is the author's first novel and though initially I thought it was a standalone, I recently discovered that there is a sequel due out this year.
Reviewed by Karen Meek, March 2003
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