SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME by Judith McNaught
SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME is author Judith McNaught's biggest success yet. It is a passionate love story combined with the tale of a crazed killer. The women are all incredibly beautiful and the men are macho to the nth degree. These elements work in the story but the plot itself is a little contrived and the pacing of the book is much too slow.
Leigh and Logan Manning are one of New York's "perfect" couples. She is a Broadway star and he is a business whiz. They appear to have it all - fame, fortune and each other. As the book opens they are planning a weekend retreat in upper state New York. Logan goes up to their new cabin ahead of Leigh, and she drives up after the close of her play. Unfortunately by the time she gets on the road a snowstorm of almost blizzard proportions has rolled into the area.
Leigh is involved in an accident and Logan can not be found. The police are puzzled by these events but soon focus their attention on Michael Valente. He had had financial dealings with Logan in the past, and seems to have an unhealthy fixation on Leigh in the present. Plus he has a criminal background.
When the book begins the love triangle of Logan, Leigh and Michael seems to be the heart of the book. After a few chapters, however, a new scenario begins to unfold and it concerns Sam Littleton, a newly arrived police investigator, and her boss Lt. Mack McChord. Their relationship is more interesting and more believable than the seemingly central one.
McNaught gets her book off to a good start as she introduces the main characters and the series of events that set up the mystery. This takes up about the first third of the book. But the second third is tedious going. Here the characters' actions become repetitive and the plotline bogs down. Everything which occurs seems to be just so much filler. Luckily the pace picks up in the final third and brings the book to a satisfactory conclusion.
There are red herrings galore in the story which keeps the reader from solving the mystery too early on. Plus there are little "hints" of upcoming plot revelations which never occur. This is particularly true in an astrologer's forecast of death which never takes place. The reader who has latched on to this "prediction" feels a little gypped by the non-occurrence.
There is some reading pleasure to be found in McNaught's book, but it isn't as much or as impressive as you expect. A good fifty pages could have been excised from the story to make the book faster paced and more enjoyable.
SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME is published by Atria Books. It contains 434 pages and sells for $25.00.