Marilyn's Mystery Reads

I was hooked from the first pages of Last Act of All in which a woman who has confessed to killing her former husband is about to released from prison.  Her sentence was for nine months, as she was convicted of manslaughter rather than murder, and there is sympathy for her since the members of the jury and the judge know Neville Fielding for the evil man he was.  Helena Fielding refuses to explain her actions despite the pleas of her barrister; he assures her that an explanation of the truth would almost certainly result in no prison time at all, but she remains adamant.

The novel takes place in the present and in flashbacks.  Helena and Neville meet as young actors, each recognizing the other’s talent and charisma.  In addition to those qualities, however, they also bring memories of their unhappy childhoods–Helena, brought up by a controlling and strict father after her mother’s death when she was twelve; Neville, who had changed his name from Norman Smith to sound more aristocratic, was an abandoned child who spent his childhood in an orphanage.  Both want to expunge their pasts and start anew, but of course it’s never that easy.

Although they both have early success, it is Neville who is determined to climb to the top of the entertainment ladder; somehow Helena is pushed to the back of the stage.  Then he leaves the theater for television and soon becomes “Badman” Harry Bradman, the protagonist everyone loves to hate, and the series becomes the most popular one in Britain.  With each season Neville becomes more like Harry, nasty and controlling to Helena while showing only his charming persona to most of the outside world.

Neville’s latest obsession, aside from his non-stop affairs, is to live in the remote town of Radnesfield, “a mean huddle of Fifties council houses” in the house that he buys without Helena’s input.  When she sees it she calls it an “unspeakable monstrosity,” but her husband, not surprisingly, disregards her feelings.  He is delighted with it, its disreputable state somehow just what he wants.  He manages to bring all his bad qualities to the town, making enemies of nearly all the men while sleeping with their wives, until finally Helena has enough and leaves him, returning to London.  They divorce shortly after.

The trope of a small town with an unpopular outsider who manages to enrage nearly the entire population is a familiar one, but this mystery succeeds in creating an original narrative filled with believable characters.  Even Neville, whom readers will agree receives his just desserts, provokes a sliver of sympathy.  And Helena’s false confession is totally believable given the circumstances surrounding her.

Aline Templeton wrote this outstanding mystery in 1996, and I’m sorry it took me so long to discover it.  You can read more about the author at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.