Review – Audiobook: The Lost Years by Mary Higgins Clark
The Lost Years
by Mary Higgins Clark
Narrated by Jan Maxwell
Genre: Mystery
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Publish Date: April 3, 2012
Format: Audio, 8 hours | 6 minutes
Audio Listening Level: Intermediate
Rating: 3½ of 5
A priceless letter, believed to be written by Jesus to Joseph of Arimathea, has been discovered by biblical scholar Jonathan Lyons. The letter had not been seen since the 1500s when it was stolen from the Vatican.
Several days after revealing the existence of the letter to several experts, Jonathan is found shot dead in his study. His wife was found holding the murder weapon. But she suffers from dementia and was incoherent, unable to tell the police who shot her husband. The police, taking the easy route, assume she is killer. But there are others that would kill to possess the letter or to sell it in the underground black market. Their daughter, Mariah, must now solve the mystery, save her mother and find the rare letter which is missing from her father’s study.
I read my first Mary Higgins Clark novel in the 80s and after all these years she can still write an entertaining mystery story. It was light and enjoyable with a fairly well-developed cast of characters. The inclusion of a parent with Alzheimer’s is timely and relevant and may hit home for a lot of the author’s readers. It was handled well and brought up a few questions on how much stress authorities should place on a person with dementia.
I don’t know if there is any biblical accuracy to the letter, but that didn’t really matter. It was not meant to be controversial or heavy on religion, the letter was a plot device for the murder. The only problem I had with the story was that I figured out the murderer half-way through the book. But it was satisfying enough that I stuck around until the end to be sure I was correct.
Jan Maxwell’s voice was a pleasure to listen to with an evenly paced narration. At only eight hours in length, this was a quick listen while I multi-tasked around the house and garden. Although the plot was easy to follow, I rated the listening level intermediate because there are a lot of characters and each chapter changes the point-of-view, requiring a little extra concentration.
Fans of the author will enjoy this novel. This formula has worked well for her and this book is no exception. New readers looking for an escape into a pleasant mystery may find also find this to their liking.
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Source: Review copy.
© 2012 Under My Apple Tree. All rights reserved.
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Under My Apple Tree 
Leslie, this does like a good mystery with issues relevant to our times, such as Alzheimer’s. I am in awe of all the audio books you manage to fit into your schedule!
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My listening time has increased now that the weather is good and I’m outside in the garden. On the other hand, my print reading time has decreased.
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I haven’t read any of her work in years but it is always entertaining.
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My daughter told me about Mary Clark’s latest offering and on doing a review search, 1st came across someone who didn’t think it was as good as previous books and then someone who thought it was 5 star. So we needed a 3rd opinion! I came across a link on the 2nd site to a radio show that had spoken about the book recently (bookreportradio(dot)com), so listened to the online recording of the show. I’ve generally never been much of an audiobook listener, preferring my own narration, but the piece read from the book was really easy-listening and at 8 hrs, would actually be viable for a quick weekend “read”. The radio book show seems to discuss about 5 or 6 books a week, with an author interview too, so I thought I may spread the word along-seemed like a good way of getting a feel for some of the books out there. Thank you for your input into my decision to listen to this (and give audio books a try again) 🙂
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It’s a quick, easy listen. I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for stopping by.
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