In the Presence of the Enemy - Softcover

George, Elizabeth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0553576089 ISBN 13: 9780553576085

Publisher: Bantam, 1997

Synopsis

Hailed as the "king of sleaze," tabloid editor Dennis Luxford is used to ferreting out the sins and scandals of people in exposed positions. But when he opens an innocuous-looking letter addressed to him at The Source, he discovers that someone else excels at ferreting out secrets as well.

Ten-year-old Charlotte Bowen has been abducted, and if Luxford does not admit publicly to having fathered her, she will die. But Charlotte's existence is Luxford's most fiercely guarded secret, and acknowledging her as his child will throw more than one life and career into chaos. Luxford knows that the story of Charlotte's paternity could make him a laughingstock and reveal to his beautiful wife and son the lie he's lived for a decade. Yet it's not only Luxford's reputation that's on the line: it's also the reputation—and career—of Charlotte Bowen's mother. For she is Undersecretary of State for the Home Office, one of the most high-profile Junior Ministers and quite possibly the next Margaret Thatcher.

Knowing that her political future hangs in the balance, Eve Bowen refuses to let Luxford damage her career by printing the story or calling the police. So the editor turns to forensic scientist Simon St. James for help. It's a case that fills St. James with disquiet, however, for none of the players in the drama seem to react the way one would expect.

Then tragedy occurs and New Scotland Yard becomes involved. Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley soon discovers that the case sends tentacles from London into the countryside, and he must simultaneously outfox death as he probes Charlotte Bowen's mysterious disappearance. Meanwhile, his partner Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers, working part of the investigation on her own and hoping to make the coup of her career, may be drawing closer to a grim solution—and to danger—than anyone knows.

In the Presence of the Enemy is a brilliantly insightful and haunting novel of ideals corrupted by self-interest, of the sins of parents visited upon children, and of the masks that hide people from each other—and from themselves.

About this title

Review:

In her previous novels, including the bestselling Playing for the Ashes, George has developed the characters of forensic scientist Simon St. James, Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley and Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers to a fine degree. In this, her eighth novel, the secret love child of an ambitious politician and a sleazy tabloid publisher is kidnapped. When Scotland Yard gets involved, Lynley and Havers must elude death as they search for the child and her kidnappers. An insightful and haunting novel of ideals corrupted and retribution visited upon the heads of the innocent.

From the Publisher:

"Combining the eloquence of P.D. James with a story John Grisham would envy, George serves up a splendid, unsettling novel."
--People

"Elizabeth George reigns as queen of the mystery genre....the Lynley books constitute the smartest, most gratifyingly complex and impassioned mystery series now being published."
--Entertainment Weekly

"Rich...and addictively readable...elegant and unsettling, classy and caustic...a page-turner with unusual breadth and generous depth."
--USA Today

"Elizabeth George only gets better...another superb British mystery."
--Daily News, New York

"A masterpiece." --Winston-Salem Journal

"Tough, breathtaking."
--Cosmopolitan

"A dazzler."
--The New Yorker

About this edition

• Publisher: Bantam
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0553576089
• ISBN 13: 9780553576085
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 656