46. Two Little Girls in Blue

46. Two Little Girls in Blue by Mary Higgins Clark (2/10/12 - 2/11/12)

Do not mistake the speed with which I read this book for enthusiasm.  On the contrary: this book, while interesting, was stunningly poorly written, which allowed me to breeze right through it.  I was pretty irritated by this book, especially since this author is a huge bestseller, so I definitely gave away some key plot points in this post -- you've been warned.

It's not that the content of the book was that bad -- the plot was fairly interesting, and involved enough that I wasn't sure of who the criminal mastermind was until the very end. Two twin girls are kidnapped, and while one is eventually returned alive, the other is claimed dead.  However, she isn't -- the kidnappers have decided to keep her as their own kid.  The girls can still communicate through 'twin talk,' and this ultimately helps the FBI and the parents understand that the other girl is still alive. Eventually, of course, this little girl is returned alive. (I would claim spoiler alert, but it's pretty obvious throughout the book that Clark isn't going to kill the second little girl.)

So: the plot sounds pretty good. But the conversational language of the book was completely stilted -- everyone talked like they were in Victorian England and would be kicked out of society for using contractions.  And, even though two of the characters were three-year-olds, they still spoke in the exact same way as all of the adults.  Clark isn't even a talented enough writer to consider the fact that a little kid will not speak in full sentences or perfect English, and she is certainly not a good enough writer to implement that fact in her book.  In addition, in my personal opinion, there were a lot of religious overtones that I did not find either interesting or even slightly relevant to the plot of the book.

Plus, and it really irritates me when authors do this, the ending of the book is really cliche and preachy.  It ends with everyone sitting in the family's living room, watching the reunited twins play, and the FBI agent starts thinking things like, "It's too bad all kidnapping cases don't have happy endings like this one."  Frankly, that's too picture-perfect -- I don't want to read a book that paints a portrait of a perfect world. There is no such thing -- Clark totally ignores the potential for the second little girl to suffer from PTSD or flashbacks over how she was treated, or that the girls may never want to leave their home again, or that the mom is totally going to become so overprotective she never lets the girls do anything, ever. All of this is ignored in favor of "everything is perfect now, and too bad all kidnapped kids don't live."  Really?!

I was so disappointed with this book. I don't think I'll ever touch a Mary Higgins Clark mystery ever again.  As far as I'm concerned, this is just an example of why the title of "New York Times Bestseller" does absolutely NOT mean that the book is actually a quality read.