DERYN LAKE – The Mills of God. Severn House, UK, hardcover, 2010.

Genre:   Traditional mystery. Leading characters:  Rev. Nicholas Lawrence/DI Dominic Tennant; 1st in series. Setting:   England.

First Sentence:   It was, thought Nick, peering through the windscreen of his
somewhat battered red Peugeot, a very oddly shaped village.

    The Reverend Nick Lawrence arrives at his new perish in the village of Lakehurst. Awaiting him is an assortment of village characters, a 16th century vicarage, complete with ghost, and a serial murderer.

    DI Dominic Tennant, and his sergeant, Potter, come to catch a killer before the town’s small population is even further reduced.

    Ms. Lake is taking a new direction, moving away from her historical mysteries, which I love, into the contemporary. There are a few stumbles along the way but I’ve also learned that Ms. Lake had a serious issue which necessitated her writing the book much more quickly than normal.

    That, to me as a long-time reader of her work, does explain the weaknesses of this book which I am sure would have been corrected otherwise.

   The story is set in a very small village, and there are a lot of characters. This could be confusing except that each is very well defined through a nice, brief, comprehensive introduction. Most of the characters come through as stereotypes rather than eccentrics, and I did have an issue with a comment that a married man with a disagreeable wife could decide to go gay.

   However, there were some wonderful secondary characters as well and I look forward to seeing them again. I particularly appreciated that there were some relationships that, while confusing to some, worked well for those involved.

    The exceptions are our protagonists. Father Nick, the new vicar, is young at 28 and understandably focused, but a bit too much so, on the attractive women of his parish. He is modern and accepting of others. I also appreciated that he doesn’t go blinding off without protection and didn’t try to solve the murders, but rather provided assistance to the police.

   The police were well represented by DI Dominic Tennant, who gets tired and misses having a woman in his life, and his sergeant Potter. I very much like the relationship between the two men. These are characters I want to follow and about whom I want to know more.

    The sense of place and dialogue needed a bit of work. While some of the descriptions were wonderful, others left me wanted. In the first sentence, we told the village is very oddly shaped, but never in what way or why. The cover art on the hard cover shows deep snow, but snow is never mentioned in the text (I blame the cover artist), and other than a slight reference to cold, the weather and season are never really defined until almost the end.

    The dialogue at times flowed very well, but at other times, seemed awkward. What really saved the book was the very well structured plot and Ms. Lake’s ability to portray differing attitudes really well.

    You sense of frustration of the police and there is just the right level of menace. There is a small red herring, which I appreciated, and I was never able to anticipate the next move in the plot and certainly not the killer.

    I also very much liked the realism that while the “who” of the killer is identified; the “why” is left something of a question both to the characters and the readers.

    For its flaws, I enjoyed this book very much. I recommend one forgive the weaknesses — Ms. Lake is a good-enough author to correct them next time out — revel in the strengths, for there are many, and enjoy.

    There was definitely more good than bad about the book, as reflected by my immediate reaction of wondering when the next in this series will be available.

Rating:   Good Plus.

Editorial Comment:   The series of historical mysteries written by Deryn Lake that LJ refers to above currently consists of 13 adventures of 18th century apothecary John Rawlings, who teams up with Sir John Fielding, London’s famous blind Bow Street magistrate, in most if not all of them. Covers for these can be seen on the Fantastic Fiction website.