An Afternoon Walk (1971) by Dorothy Eden #Reading1971 #20BOS26

🟢 Judging only by this book's title and the particular cover I used for the post, you would think this as a charming slice-of-life novel set in the English countryside with picturesque view, and perhaps a little bit of romance. Well, just wait until you come upon the Kindle version's cover, published in 2013, which I included below. Then, you would realize that this is actually a psychological mystery-suspense with Gothic vibes. It begins with the alluded afternoon walk. Ella Simpson, an ordinary housewife, is taking the walk with her five-year-old daughter Kitty, when they found a derelict old Victorian house with an overgrown garden. They were curious about it and while starting to imagine who had lived there - an Edith definitely, as they saw the name scratched on the window pane - and what had happened to the family, an owl screeched from an upstairs window, and startled and spooked them. When they left the house, Ella felt the uneasiness of being followed.  

🟢 Ella's husband, a salesman called Max, is coming home that day. When she told him about the old house and Edith, he only laughed it out as Ella's silliness and imagination. But his tease didn't end there. During the weeks following the incident, Max repeatedly pointed out Ella's increasing dreamy and forgetfulness, which, he believed, is normal considering the miscarriage that Ella had just had. Then mysterious things started to happen, menacing phone calls, mysterious men following her, and even a few panic-induced prank which added stress to the overwrought Ella. Is it true that she's forgetting everything? That she's imagining things? Is Max's upcoming promotion as export manager the rooted cause of it all - that his jealous colleague is behind all these, like he's always reasoning?

🟢 Fortunately, Ella's new neighbour, Booth, is sympathetic enough to listen to Ella's rumbling stories. He even accompanied her to another walk to the ruined house. Booth is a theater critic, and widower, who lives there with his sister. It is clear from the beginning that he's fallen in love with Ella, and indeed, he is a more suitable husband for Ella than her self-centered and ambitious Max, who was secretly relieved of Ella's miscarriage, as otherwise another baby would interfere with his work. Meanwhile, the newspapers and TV is full about the, first disappearing, then kidnapping, then murder of a woman, which crime was supposedly happened inside the old ruined house. 

🟢 Throughout perhaps two third of the book Eden made us keep wondering whether Ella was really the imaginative kind of woman, or was it all Max's plot to... what? Does he mean to harm his wife? Or is he covering something he ought not to do? Does it have something to do with the woman's kidnapping? However, near the end, I think it would be clearer and clearer what was happening. On the whole, this is an interesting psychological mystery-suspense. Not very mysterious, and not overly suspenseful, but quite entertaining for a comfortable reading. More importantly, it provides a insightful glimpse of that bygone era of early 1970s - which was why I read it in the first place. I am satisfied with how the story ends, and though I'm not overly fond with Ella's dreamy nature (miscarriage or not), Booth's character is what I loved most.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

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20 Books of Summer 2026

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Airs Above the Ground (1965) by Mary Stewart

🐎 My second read of Mary Stewart brought me to Austria, to the circus and dancing Lippizaner stallions. The heroine is Vanessa March, a young wife, whose salesman husband is supposed to be on business trip to Stockholm, but she saw his glimpse on a newsreel, during a big fire in a circus in Austria! And moreover, with a young blonde on his side. So, when a friend asked her to chaperone a seventeen year boy who will be on a flight to his estranged father in Austria, well... how can Vanessa resist the trip? After some awkward moments, the young wife and the teenage boy open up to each other about their real intentions. Vanessa isn't coming to join her husband on holiday, and Timothy, the teenage boy, isn't to see his father. Tim is obsessed with horses, and intends to seek a job in the Spanish Riding School.

🐎 After the confessions, so to speak, they immediately become close friends and partner-in-crime. They soon found two things. That the blonde from the newsreel is Annalisa Wagner, the daughter of the circus owner, who performs with the dancing horses; and that Lee Elliot, who'd been helping in the circus, is none other than Lewis March, Vanessa's husband, and whose real job is not salesman, but a secret service agent! He is meeting his colleague, who was found dead during the circus fire, together with Annalisa's Uncle Franzl. Naturally, Timothy and Vanessa - who would have been a veterinarian had she not married - are delighted that Lewis asked them to loiter and look around for anything suspicious. What they find in the circus stable is Old Piebald - Franzl's old horse with a swollen leg (hematoma) during the fire. Vanessa operated the leg, and thus, bind a relationship with the old white horse.

🐎 The circus was a lovely addition to this book's charm. That, and the dancing horses. 'Airs above the ground' are the beautiful, traditional dance moves that the trained Lippizaner stallions do, including the levade, where the horse rears up and holds his pose.

The best part of the book is when Vanessa brought Old Piebald to graze on a patch of grass outside the circus tents, one evening. His leg was still a bit lame. It was during the show; Tim was watching, and Vanessa and Old Piebald were alone. Then suddenly, tuning in with the music, the horse slowly danced along. The rest is one magical moment that would carved itself into my memory deeper than the story itself.

In the distance the music changed: the Lipizzaner down in the ring would be rising into the levade, the first of the airs above the ground'. And in the high Alpine meadow, with only me for audience, old Piebald settled his hind hooves, arched his crest and tail, and, lame forefoot clear of the ground, lifted into and held the same royal and beautiful levade.

The moonlight flooded the meadow, blanching all colours to its own ghostly silver. The pines were very black. As the stallion rose in the last magnificent rear of the levade, the moonlight poured over him bleaching his hide so that for perhaps five or six seconds he reared against the black background, a white horse dappled with shadows, no longer an old broken-down gypsy's piebald, but a haute école stallion, of the oldest line in Europe.

🐎 All in all, this is a suspense novel with idyllic Austrian landscape as a background, and dancing Lipizzaners as a center point; spiced with some car chases and few actions. The heroine is a married woman, so you would find no romance here, as is usual with Mary Stewart's. But I think, I prefer it like this. Timothy stole my heart from the beginning, when he comforted Vanessa during the flight, as she dreaded the forthcoming landing, he said something like, I can hold your hand during the landing if you like... or something like that. And that's a gentleman on the making, Timothy Lacy! Then later on, when Lewis March appeared on the scene - and the show begins, because the suspense started with him - it is clear that Timothy adored Vanessa's husband. The villain (someone from the circus) had hit Vanessa earlier, so that she met Lewis with bruises on her face. When Lewis confronted the villain, he 'punished' him for ever laying hand onto his wife. And here, Timothy showed his admiration, which also showed his views of men hurting women. Bravo, Tim! 

* Originally I would have rated this one four stars, but the 'airs above the ground' scene of Old Piebald - his real name is Neapolitano Petra, by the way - and the ending, definitely deserved another star!

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Where Are You Now? (2008) by Mary Higgins Clark

📞 Ten years ago "Mack" Mackenzie walked out of his apartment without a word and has never been seen again. However, on every Mother's Day after that, there's been always a short phone call from Mack to his mother, saying that he's OK. Before anyone receiving the call has time to ask anything, however, he'd ring off. Thus, his family "accepted" that Mack is alright; he just wants to be left alone.

📞 On the tenth Mother's Day after he's been missing, however, his little sister Caroline couldn't take it anymore. She shouted over the phone that she will search and find Mack no matter what. After that, a piece of paper was found inside the collection bag at a church. It's a message to Caroline from Mack, to leave him alone. She brought this evidence to the police, but the detective in charge wasn't interested.

📞 When a girl called Lissie Andrew was missing after leaving a bar alone at night, the same detective found out that Caroline lives at the same apartment building with her, and suspected that there's probably a connection somehow of these two missing cases. The police then connected Lissie's case with other missing cases of young girls, one of them only days after Mack had gone missing ten years ago. Did Mack has something to do with the crime, then? When the police suspected him, Caroline is determined now more than ever, to seek the truth and to clear her brother's name.

📞 This is my second Mary Higgins Clark of the year - the first was Pretend You Don't See Her, which I liked. Where Are You Now? might not as fascinating as Pretend You Don't See Her, but it's equally highly entertaining. I can see similarity in tropes from both novels. The main characters are young women. There are always a long list of suspects. They are usually connected to one another or are acquainted with the heroine, either relatives or professional acquaintances. I guess these connections enabled the author to throw curfews and red herrings on the plot. I have no complain, because that is what makes a good suspense novel, doesn't it? Needless to say, I was enjoying this much. Same as the first read, I have also listened to the audiobook. I found it both soothing and exciting at the same time, which was what I've needed after a tedious time.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Pretend You Don't See Her (1997) by Mary Higgins Clark

🤐 It's been a long time since I've last read Mary Higgins Clark. I used to read her books along with Sandra Brown's, Nora Roberts', and Danielle Steele's when I still owned a book rental and then online secondhand bookshop (it's nearly twenty years ago). And thanks to Simon's A Century of Books, I have found Clark's Pretend You Don't See Her while browsing for a book for year 1997. It sounded good, and I missed these old school suspense novels. And it turned out to be a highly entertaining read for me. I'm happy to reconnect with Clark!

🤐 Lacey Farrell is a young energetic girl, working as a real-estate agent in Manhattan, and loving her job as well as her life. All those are about to change completely when Lacey witnessed a murder while in the course of selling a luxurious apartment.

🤐 The apartment belonged to a young girl called Heather Landy, who died last year, presumably committing suicide. Her mother doesn't believe it's a suicide, but doesn't have proof. Until the day before the deal with a potential buyer, a Mr. Sandy Sovrano. Heather's mother found a clue in her daughter's diary, and wanted Lacey to come the next day. Lacey came exactly when Sandy Sovrano shot Heather's mother. Before her last breath, the victim whispered her dying words to Lacey, to bring the diary to Heather's father (already divorced).

🤐 Lacey is the only witness who could identify the murderer, so the police put her in witness protection program. But we have read or watched so many thrillers to know how difficult it is to keep absolute secret. And how distressing it is for the witness. Lacey starts a new life, she even finds a romantic interest from the gym - a handsome and kind radio talk-show host. But Lacey knows that the only way for her to return to her normal life is by solving the mystery of Heather's death from the diary - which, of course, she copied before giving it away to Heather's father and the police. Not mentioning that the murderer knows Lacey's whereabouts and is now pursuing her...

🤐 I forgot how I used to love Mary Higgins Clark - she's crowned the queen of suspense for a reason. What I love from this book is the perfect balance Clark maintained between the mystery, suspense, and the characters development, even a sprinkle of romance. The suspense isn't the kind that scares you all through, but something of a page-turner. It will be interspersed everytime with the characters' everyday life, so that the end result is a fun read with cheerful tone rather than a dark thriller. Just the perfect combination for a holiday reading or just a refreshing reading after a day's working like mine.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐1/2