"This is definitely George's most unconventional storytelling to date, and because I like not knowing what to expect in a book, I very much enjoyed going along for the ride." ~Hank

#1 New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth George delivers another masterpiece of suspense in her Inspector Lynley series: a gripping child-in-danger story that tests Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers like never before.

Barbara is at a loss: The daughter of her friend Taymullah Azhar has been taken by her mother, and Barbara can’t really help—Azhar had never married Angelina, and his name isn’t on Hadiyyah’s, their daughter’s, birth certificate. He has no legal claim. Azhar and Barbara hire a private detective, but the trail goes cold.

Azhar is just beginning to accept his soul-crushing loss when Angelina reappears with shocking news: Hadiyyah is missing, kidnapped from an Italian marketplace. The Italian police are investigating, and the Yard won’t get involved, until Barbara takes matters into her own hands — at the risk of her own career.

As both Barbara and her partner, Inspector Thomas Lynley, soon discover, the case is far more complex than a typical kidnapping, revealing secrets that could have far-reaching effects outside of the investigation. With both her job and the life of a little girl on the line, Barbara must decide what matters most, and how far she’s willing to go to protect it.

 

Hank says:

"Just one? Seriously? You have read your own books, haven't you, Elizabeth?
 

But, in spite of the title, I found this to be one of George's less bleak stories. I'm not even sure of what the one evil act was. It seemed to be mostly about her characters muddling through the human condition, to the best of their abilities, without much bad intent.
 

Her previous story Believing the Lie contained so many lies that the reader could not be sure which one they ought to pay attention to, but Just One Evil Act didn't seem to me to contain a whole lot of evil, so much as inadvertent bad outcomes, produced by acts of desperate people. She casts her net wider than usual, complicating the police procedural by including an international element between Scotland Yard and the Italian force.
 

This 700+ page book was almost two separate stories, one of a kidnapping and one of a death that may or may not have been a murder. This is definitely George's most unconventional storytelling to date, and because I like not knowing what to expect in a book, I very much enjoyed going along for the ride. Her character Barbara Havers had a prominent role, and because I most identify with Barbara more than the rest of the cast, I had to keep reading to find out what new damage she'd done to her career by following her heart, and the long book went quickly.
 

As with my other reviews of her recent books, I can't recommend that readers start with this one, instead of going back to George's first breathtaking story A Great Deliverance. But for those of us who have been following the complexities of the interactions she's created, Just One Evil Act is a rewarding read, with a bit more redemption and hope for some of her characters than we've come to imagine possible."