Howard's end reconsidered
Harriet Waugh
DISORDERED MINDS by Minette Walters Macmillan, .E16.99, pp. 432, ISBN 1405034165 Minette Walters is an unusually uneven writer. Although we know she is just one person it is as though there are two writers taking it in turns to produce the novels. Her last one, Fox Evil, was a histrionic, scrappy affair, while Disordered Minds is far more intriguing, and has characters that seriously engage your interest since what they are, in the wide spectrum of good and evil, is as much at the heart of the mystery as the gradually accumulating evidence.
Two people come together to re-examine the facts that led to the conviction for murder in 1970 of a retarded young man called Howard Stamp. His reclusive aunt, Grace, like him afflicted with a cleft palate, was stabbed to death in her house. She had cuts on her legs and thighs before being dispatched in a frenzied attack. The killer then had a bath to wash off the blood, leaving some ginger hairs behind. Howard, who killed himself while in prison, had ginger hair. The killing caused shock waves in the community and it was a relief when the police arrested her misfit nephew.
At the beginning of the novel aggressively arrogant social anthropologist Dr Jonathan Hughes arranges to meet county councillor George Gardiner at a dubious pub in Bournemouth to discuss the possibility of a book exonerating Howard Stamp of the murder. Gardiner has been trying to reopen the case for years while Hughes has written a paper highlighting it. They, and the reader, are in for surprises when they meet. The meeting starts off badly and with the help of the publican Roy Trent, who was a teenager when the murder took place, ends worse. It takes Jonathan's literary agent Andrew Spicer's considerable powers of persuasion to get them back together. When they do join forces they find there is a strong likelihood that the disappearance at that time of a 13-year-old schoolgirl called Cill Trevelyan is connected to the death of Grace. All this took place within the confines of a housing estate in Bournemouth in early June 1970. Cill's best friend claimed that Cill had been gang-raped a few days earlier and it was known that she had a difficult home life. Nothing has been heard of her since.
Gradually a complex picture emerges. Nobody is telling the truth. Could Roy Trent's ex-wife Cill be the missing Cill? If she isn't, is her name merely a coincidence? Why did she go through Jonathan's attaché case? Why does Roy lie for her? Why does Roy want to sow discord between Jonathan and George? Has Cill been murdered? Did Cill murder Grace? What part did her less attractive and jealous best friend Lou play in the drama of those days following Cill's rape and disappearance and Grace's death? Who were the three rapists and what consequently happened to them? And, lastly, what about all those horrible parents who were responsible for all those unhappy teenagers?
Some of the answers are fairly obvious, but others twist and turn, seeming one thing, then another. Each character's personality shifts, as more becomes known. Readers have the overview of the action and the collating of evidence as Jonathan, George, Andrew the agent, and certain characters contribute to the jigsaw. This means they are the only ones who can see how the pieces might slot together. In most crime fiction the detective keeps something up his or her sleeve. This is then sprung on the reader when the villain is unmasked. Here, Jonathan and George have to struggle to find the pattern. Despite the fact that the reader is given far more information than they, nothing is plain sailing. Disordered Minds is a very enjoyable, sophisticated affair.
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