I've never panned for gold, but I can imagine my delight at finding a nugget or two amid the rocks. Similarly, given the substantial number of books I read each year - some wonderful and some not so much - it's a treat to find a gem like this one.
The story is, if I may borrow the title of another novel and motion picture, an anatomy of a murder; after all, readers know from the start that the title character isn't new to the game ("Evelyn's first murder was an accident," the description reads). That at least one more follows, then, comes as no big surprise.
Discovering the who and why is what kept me reading almost nonstop (which didn't take long; at 185 pages, the book is closer to a short story than a novel). It's well thought out, riveting and reminiscent, at least to me, of Hemingway's "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber." And that's a good thing.
Evelyn Marsh can lay claim to being a "normal" housewife; at age 49, she's been in a somewhat boring but comfortable marriage for 25 years. Now that their two children are grown and out of the house, she's looking into selling the artwork she's been giving away all those years - encouraged by friends and family (except perhaps for her successful lawyer-husband, who's content to have a stay-at-home wife with a nice hobby).
What follows is a story of betrayal and awakening of inner emotions that most likely lie within all of us. Are we all capable of following a course of action as Evelyn did? Probably. Would we? Probably not - at least I'm pretty sure I wouldn't. But on the other hand, I'm willing to concede that anything is possible.
Just because I know folks who would be upset by sexually graphic language, I'm compelled to note that there's a little of that in here. As one who's way too old not to have heard those words before, I'll call this one a winner and thank the author for sending me a copy to review.
Evelyn Marsh by S.W. Clemens (Kindle Press, March 2017); 185 pp.
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