Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Review - The Stalking Lamb by Marian Babson


Title: The STALKING LAMB
Author: Marian Babson
Paperback Mystery
Published: 1974
ISBN:0-553-27171-7-395Add Image

Sister's Ginny and Amy join their friend Belle when Belle returns home to England. For Amy and Ginny this is a vacation adventure of lifetime. Belle leaves her two friends while she travels to visit her grandmother. So Ginny and Amy take in all the sights but one day Ginny refuses to budge as she wants to stay in bed. She's is tired and doesn't want to go sight seeing or to a movie, certainly not to lunch.
Amy takes off on her own and before she knows it she has met a charming stranger named Aaron. Soon Aaron is a fixture with Amy and his friend Zlot has taken up with her sister Ginny. The four of them party and have great fun together. Then one day Amy and Ginny discover they have been robbed except it isn't their things missing but all the beautiful and expensive things in the home that Belle's family uses when they visit London. It could only be Aaron and Zlot who have helped themselves to what has been stolen. Worse Belle returns and the sisters explain they've been robbed. Belle waves it off and says the things are insured.
But when Aaron and Zlot show up on the scene Belle, doesn't take to them and that is when a dream trip becomes a nightmare. Now time passes and Amy sits by a window in the rest home she has been placed in and watches everyone coming and going in the mews. She is recovering the nightmare and knows no matter what anyone tells her that she is still in danger. To pass the time she stitches a huge picture and there is always chatty cheerful Nurse Jelicoe to whom Amy doesn't trust for one second. Her sister Ginny is alive but lost in her own state of being. Ginny hasn't spoken since that fatal day. Amy doesn't say any more than she has to and her keen eyes miss nothing. If Amy knows one thing she knows that Aaron is coming to finish the job he started. He is no longer a charming stranger but a living nightmare and most probably will be Amy's undoing. He will not catch her by surprise for she lays in wait by the window for him.
THE STALKING LAMB is the most beautifully laid out cozy/traditional mystery I have ever read. I don't do the book justice in my review. This is more than a mystery it's a work of art, a masterpiece so enriching in word, thought and action that you will never ever forget this book. The plot is simple enough and yet the complexity of emotion, beauty, and strength of character never misses for a moment to lead the reader on the search for the truth. Compelling and loaded with atmosphere THE STALKING LAMB by Marian Babson is a brilliant masterpiece. ***********

Pamela James/ Author Of The Crossed Stitcher

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