Prompt Proofing Blog Post: Book Review - The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton

    VANCOUVER, BC, December 28, 2012 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Kate Morton's The Secret Keeper takes you back in time to the early 1960s, where we meet 16-year-old Laurel, who witnesses her mother commit an unspeakable act at her baby brother's birthday party.

Opening with such a strong plot point could make you wonder if the book will succeed in maintaining momentum, but there isn't any concern of that when Morton then plunges us back in time even further, to the unique period of World War II, when relationships, lives and decisions were all dictated by the harsh living conditions resulting from years of ongoing war. Here we get a glimpse into Laurel's mother in her early 20s, navigating love, ambition and friendships while volunteering for the war effort and witnessing and experiencing tragedy during the endless bombings in London.

The book is separated into volumes, each focusing on one character - first Laurel, then her mother Dorothy, then Vivien, Dorothy's friend in the 1940s. However, each volume still dedicates sections to each of the various protagonists, and therefore I found this volume segregation redundant and confusing. There is also a lot of jumping back and forth between the 1940s and present day England - 2011 - in which a 66-year-old Laurel is struggling to discover the truth about what really happened on that day 50 years earlier, realizing that her time is limited as her mother lies on her deathbed.

This jumping back and forth in time serves a purpose, but ultimately becomes confusing as the reader is given information that Laurel does not yet know, and thus keeping track of who knows what in which time period becomes an arduous task on its own and can distract the reader from the book's narrative.

However, the book picks up pace nicely in the final third and I struggled to put it down, staying up till 3am to finish the book off at last. The characters are well fleshed out and real, though funnily enough I found the 1940s wartime characters far more relatable and understandable than the modern-day ones - and the impact of the war is certainly felt. You do not feel as though the war was merely a backdrop, but rather a character itself in the way it impacted the outcomes of the characters' lives and perhaps even provided reasons for their actions.

While at times confusing and repetitive, this book is definitely worth a read if you're looking for a gripping whodunit combined with in-depth character and relationship depictions.

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