New York Times best seller Laura Lippman returns with a classic story of murder and mystery, in which one man's disappearance echoes through the lives of his wife, daughters - and mistress. When Felix Brewer meets nineteen-year-old Bernadette 'Bambi' Gottschalk at a Valentine's Dance in 1959, he charms her with wild promises, some of which he actually keeps. Thanks to his lucrative if not always legal businesses, she and their three little girls live in luxury. But on the Fourth of July, 1976, Bambi's world implodes when ...
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New York Times best seller Laura Lippman returns with a classic story of murder and mystery, in which one man's disappearance echoes through the lives of his wife, daughters - and mistress. When Felix Brewer meets nineteen-year-old Bernadette 'Bambi' Gottschalk at a Valentine's Dance in 1959, he charms her with wild promises, some of which he actually keeps. Thanks to his lucrative if not always legal businesses, she and their three little girls live in luxury. But on the Fourth of July, 1976, Bambi's world implodes when Felix, newly convicted and facing prison, mysteriously vanishes. Though Bambi has no idea where her husband - or his money - might be, she suspects one woman does: his devoted young mistress, Julie. When Julie herself disappears ten years to the day that Felix went on the lam, everyone assumes she's left to join her -old lover - until her remains are found in a secluded wooded park. Now, twenty-six years after Julie went missing, Roberto 'Sandy' Sanchez, a retired Baltimore detective working cold cases for some extra cash, is investigating her murder. What he discovers is a tangled web of bitterness, jealously, resentment and greed stretching over the three decades and three generations that connect these five very different women. And at the center of every woman's story is the man who, though long gone, has never been forgotten: the enigmatic Felix Brewer. Somewhere between the secrets and lies connecting past and present, Sandy could find the explosive truth...
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It pains me to admit how many times I tossed this book aside; I found the way Laura Lippman moved the story -- forward and backward, then to a midpoint, constantly moving the story and time -- to be disconcerting. After awhile, it simply became irritating. The book often moved slower than a snail.
The other problem I had with this story is that I didn't really care about any of the characters. The story begins about the time Felix Brewer was convicted and about to go to prison. Instead, he abandons his wife and 3 daughters and escapes the country for parts unknown. Much of the rest of the story is how beautiful Bernadette "Bambi" Gottschalk Brewer and daughters and friends survive without him.
The only character I felt marginally interested in was the wronged wife, Bambi. Felix always had a swarm of lovers around him; he took care of his latest paramour, Julie, by giving her a business.
His wife was left destitute but she refused to accept Felix was gone and never filed for his life insurance or veteran's benefits. Instead, she kept up appearances in the huge home she and Felix bought ? even though she did not have the resources to do so.
Their three daughters were some of the most pathetic specimens in modern fiction. I found little/nothing to admire about them individually or as a group. They seemed to be hateful harpies.
I haven't really enjoyed the last two Lippman books much {AND WHEN SHE WAS GOOD (2012) and AFTER I'M GONE (2014)}. Laura Lippman has been one of my favorite authors, but I think she's heading in a direction where I don't plan to follow. This makes two books filled with unlikeable characters doing ?who cares? kinds of things.
