Tuesday, 28 April 2009
The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld
Book Title: The Interpretation of Murder
Author Name: Jed Rubenfeld
Why I decided to read this book: It caught my eye when I was desperate to spend a book voucher. The blurb on the back intrigued me.
Summary: This novel is set in Manhattan in 1909, when Sigmund Freud made his first and only visit to the United States. A rich, young, beautiful woman is found bound and strangled to death in her apartment. The next night another heiress, Nora Acton, is found tied up in her parents' house, alive but wounded, unable to speak and with no memory of her ordeal. Freud and his American follower Stratham Younger are asked by the mayor of New York City to help her recover her memory in order to find out who is responsible - before the killer can silence her forever.
Strengths: This is a well-written whodunnit. The beginning creates a brooding atmosphere of suspense and intrigue that grips the reader to the end. There is some strong characterisation, too, which creates both sinister suspects and interesting characters for the reader to feel concern for. Overall, the novel is enjoyable, gripping and I found it difficult to put down, which is why I read it in one day, even though it is over 500 pages long.
Weaknesses: Before reading this book, I was impressed that Rubenfeld had the confidence to attempt to portray both Freud and Jung as fairly important characters in this book. I have read other novels which have tried this trick and failed dismally. In fact, previously, the only novels that have, in my opinion, used real-life people as characters successfully have only used them as minor characters, unlike this novel. I did, however, get the impression that a lot of research had been done to make Freud true to life, although I'm not much of an expert on the man so I can't say whether it is successful. I know even less about Jung, but I was not as impressed with his portrayal, for some reason. Overall, I feel using these characters may have weakened the reader's suspension of belief at certain moments, but Rubenfeld has done a better job than other authors. A bigger weakness is the predictability of parts of the plot; for instance, I don't see how Younger failed to see the identity of Nora's secret crush when I had realised several pages beforehand. Also, I felt the romance parts of the story were not as well written as the rest of the novel. The ending felt rather unsatisfying: considering how much I had enjoyed the rest of the novel, I felt a little let down when I closed the book.
Overall Opinion: I enjoyed reading this book. It's a good murder mystery/thriller with some interesting description of a brief period of time in the life of Freud. But I doubt I'll ever decide to read it again.
Rating out of Five: 
