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Lisa Gardner worked as a management consultant after obtaining a degree in International Relations. She began writing romantic suspense novels under the pseudonym of Alicia Scott, being so successful and garnering so many awards that she forsook the real world and consultancy after two years in favour of the fictional more romantic world. In 1998 she inverted her writing career and instead of creating novels of romance spiced with suspense she began, by now under her real name, producing suspense novels with a thick layer of love. The Perfect Husband The Other Daughter The Third Victim, and The Next Accident were extremely successful and launched the career of Special Agent Pierce Quincey. Now in The Survivors Club Gardner has turned her talents more to the police procedural. I was interested to note, too, that there is in this opus far less romance than her previous mystery tales. Rape is not a pleasant topic yet it comprises the main theme of this opus. Three women, Jillian Hayes, Carol Rosen and Meg Pesaturo have been the victims of the College Hill Rapist. Jillian, while not having been raped, was beaten severely when she interrupted the rapist who had been busy with her sister, Trisha. Trisha had an allergy to latex and suffered fatal anaphylaxis when the rapist used his trademark latex to bind and gag her. Carol Rosen came by her victim status serendipitously when the true target of the rapist was unavailable at the time the rapist struck. Her marriage has been threatened and is nearing destruction. Meg, the youngest of the women, was raped but she is fortunate in that she does not remember the act. Her previous life has become a total blank although occasionally there are faint stirrings of unproductive memory. The three women form the Survivors Club, seeing themselves in that role rather than as victims, and seek to aid the police in their investigations. Their efforts in detection culminate in the police arresting Eddie Como, a young family man, for the rape. The main action of the book begins when Eddie is assassinated on the morning on which he is about to stand trial. The narrative does begin with Gardner's customary mysterious prologue which sets the scene for the remaining action. Detective Sergeant Roan Griffin, who is himself psychologically damaged by his life's recent vicissitudes, has been assigned to the case. Griffin's wife had died of cancer and the man who was Griffin's neighbour and close friend, David Price, had been discovered to be the Candy Man murderer, a paedophile who took great delight in killing off all witnesses to his crimes. Griffin, an overly large man with an equally large temper, has just returned to work and it falls to him to discover why, if Eddie Como is dead, the townspeople as well as the Survivors Club, are fearful that he is still assiduously pursuing his chosen career. Lisa Gardner is not renowned for telling a simple story. While the plot of this novel may be marginally less convoluted than that of her previous suspense novels, it is still extremely circuitous and tortuous. This having been said, the book seemed to have rather more staying power than its predecessors. In her earlier books I found the plots so improbable that I tended to lose interest early on. This effort held my attention for much longer. Certainly there is plenty of action and the perils of the protagonists are sufficiently chilling to raise the hair on one's neck. I trust that in her future books Ms. Gardner will tend to discard her proclivitiy for complications and tell a straightforward story with a convincing plot. Editor's Note: This is a review of the Australian edition  from Orion released on July 5, 2002 at a price of $Au29.95
Reviewed by Denise Wels, July 2002
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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