Past Caring, Robert Goddard
I remember loving this book when I read it in 1987 or so. And yet, I am not sure I ever read another book by him after this one, his first. Here is an amazon synopsis. As commenters note, it bears some resemblance to Daughter of Time in its examination of an historical event. If I ever get a chance, I will read it again.
"At a lush villa on the sun-soaked island of Madeira, Martin Radford is given a second chance. His life ruined by scandal, Martin holds in his hands the leather-bound journal of another ruined man, former British cabinet minister Edwin Strafford. What’s more, Martin is being offered a job—to return to England and investigate the rise and fall of Strafford, an ambitious young politician whose downfall, in 1910, is as mysterious as the strange deaths that still haunt his family.
Martin is intrigued by Strafford’ s story, by the man’s overwhelming love for a beautiful suffragette, by her inexplicable rejection of him and their love affair’s political repercussions. But as he retraces Strafford’s ruination, Martin realizes that Strafford did not fall by chance; he was pushed. Suddenly Martin, who has not cared for many people in his life, cares desperately—about a man’s mysterious death and a family’s terrible secret, about a love beyond reckoning and betrayal beyond imagining. Most of all Martin cares because the story he is uncovering is not yet over—and among the men and women still caught in its web, Martin himself may be the most vulnerable of all…."
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Rob Kitchin, The Buenos Aires Quintet, Manuel Vazquez Montalban
B.V. Lawson, MURDER INK REVISED, Dilys Winn
Steve Lewis/William Deeck, THE CAT SCREAMS, Todd Downing
Todd Mason, Instant Remainders: THE BEST FANTASY STORIES FROM THE MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION edited by Edward Ferman); TALES OF TERROR edited by Eleanor Sullivan
J.F. Norris, THE MEDBURY FORT MURDE, George Limnelius
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Matt Paust, BLACKBEARD. Angus Kostum
James Reasoner, GUNSIGHT PASS, William MacLeod Raine
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Kevin Tipple, CATCH AND RELEASE: 17 STORIES, Lawrence Block
TomCat, THE MURDER OF MY AUNT, Richard Hull
TracyK, BLIND GODDESS, Anne Holt
Prashant Trikannad, FATHERLAND, Robert Harris
8 comments:
Up and at 'em:
THE BEST FANTASY STORIES FROM FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION edited by Edward Ferman (Octopus, 1985); TALES OF TERROR edited by Eleanor Sullivan (attributed to Alfred Hitchcock)(Galahad, 1986)
and Happy Birthday to Yvette Banek!
Thanks, Patti.
I discovered Goddard in 1997 and read this one, his second - IN PALE BATTALIONS - and HAND IN GLOVE, in a very short period of time. I picked up a number of other paperbacks in England over the years - I have half a dozen sitting on the shelf in here - but somehow I've never read another one. I liked the whole historical tie-ins very much (IN PALE BATTALIONS concerns the Battle of the Somme in 1916, HAND IN GLOVE the Spanish Civil War, which has always fascinated me) and really need to read another. I think I've been put off at times by the length of the books, usually when I had several other things on hand waiting to read, and when don't I?
I'm sold! I loved Daughter of Time, and am drawn anyway to stories that merge historic and modern mysteries. But I'd not known of Goddard. Thanks for the intro, Patti.
Mine's up now:
The Medbury Fort Murder by George Limnelius
Just now bought the Kindle edition of Past Caring. Thanks again, Patti.
Is it the 19th already? I was really worried there for a minute :) Thanks for corralling Patti, whatever the date!
Thank you, Patti.
I need to read more Goddard! Thanks for the reminder, Patti. And thanks for including my link here.
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