The Lost Years by Mary Higgins Clark
Reviewed by Gerti
I
am an enormous fan of Mary Higgins Clark, but had seen the book “The
Lost Years” before and chosen not to read it because I didn’t
like the plot, which seemed to me to be derivative of the currently
popular Dan Brown novels. However, now that I am running out of new
MHC books, I finally forced myself to read this book, and I’m glad
I did. The derivative part involves a recently discovered letter
written by Jesus Christ, a priceless artifact which has scholars and
archeologists scrambling. But the human aspect of the tale is about
Jonathan Lyons, a very human bible scholar who is having an affair
with a much younger woman instead of staying home to care for his
Alzheimer’s afflicted wife.
Mariah
Lyons is their daughter, and she has her own successful career in New
York as a financial planner, which is where she met the sleuthing
team of Alvirah and Willy Meehan. Clark has had great success with
this pair, whose popularity seemingly rivals that of Nick and Nora
Charles. I find them amusing, especially since Alvirah has a pin that
controls a secret recording device, which seems in a few cases to
also be able to record conversations that happened before it gets
turned on! However, they are good for a laugh and a welcome
diversion, although they don’t really solve the murder mystery
here, and seem as confused as the cops.
The
main plot, however, is that when Jonathan Lyons is killed, shot to
death in his den, there are many suspects, including his lover
Lillian and his memory-addled wife. While the police cruelly assume
Kathleen Lyons did it and that her strange behavior and memory lapses
are all an act, Mariah fights hard to keep her mother out of jail.
Four other suspects are the boys who frequently joined the family for
meals, including 2 with a crush on Mariah. Greg Pearson and Richard
Callahan are those two, with Greg’s crush being long-standing but
not reciprocated. Mariah is warming up to Richard, but is he just
being charming now to get the Jesus letter, or does he already have
it?
I
liked the premise and the story Clark weaves, although the ending
wasn’t entirely satisfactory for me. I liked protagonist Mariah,
whose character seems pretty consistent, but don’t like how her
mother’s personality seems to change by the end of the book. She
seemed a harmless Alzheimer’s sufferer to start, but when she is
later found to have violent episodes, I almost suspected there was
someone goading her at the hospital where she was being observed. I
also didn’t like Lillian, the mistress, because her personality
seemed inconsistent. She is generally a conniving B-word and then
we’re asked to be sympathetic to her plight? I don’t think so.
“The Lost Years” isn’t a perfect novel, nor is it my favorite
by MHC, but it is quite entertaining if you like that sort of stolen
treasure genre.
