Every Contact Leaves a Trace

April 1, 2013
Part meditation on grief and memory, part literary thriller, Dymott’s complex debut is thoughtful and rich in mood. London attorney Alex Peterson is mourning the loss of his wife Rachel, killed six months ago during a visit to the Oxford college where they met as students. The combination of the depth of his sadness and his legal mind draws him into the questions surrounding her unsolved murder, so when he is contacted by Rachel’s former English professor, Harry, who they were visiting the night of her death, Alex thinks the prof might have some answers. Harry relates a long and meandering tale about Rachel’s relationships with her two closest college friends and her guardian, and his own complicity in her death. Alex uses that information to piece together an explanation that reveals the slippery nature of truth and memory. Dymott’s tale is disappointing as often as it is engaging, hampered by Alex’s bland narration and too many levels of mediation, and by a slim, questionable story, but patient and forgiving readers of Gone Girl and The Secret History will be drawn in by its contemplation. Agent: Zoe Pagnamenta, the Zoe Pagnamenta Agency.

February 15, 2013
Zambia-born Oxford graduate Dymott's debut novel moves slowly through the world of academia and postgraduate life as it chronicles the murder of a woman who was as mysterious in life as she was in death. Alex Peterson and Rachel Cardadine marry after being seated near one another at the wedding of mutual friends following their graduations from Oxford. Rachel studied poetry, but Alex followed the law, and although they had known one another while students, this later meeting changed their relationship into something serious. One night, after dining with a former tutor and close friend, Rachel leaves Alex for a short walk alone by a nearby lake and is murdered. Alex is briefly arrested for the slaying, until the tutor steps forward and helps absolve him of the killing. Alex decides to dig into his dead wife's mysterious past, which includes a rocky relationship with Evie, the odd and unforgiving godmother who supported Rachel, and her friendships with two college study companions. Readers will have difficulty embracing Alex and Rachel, since neither exhibits any warmth or even a quirkiness that might make them interesting. Instead, the story moves sluggishly along, encumbered by clunky dialogue, a meandering plot and constantly changing tenses within scenes, all of which detract from the narrative tension. But the author does reveal a nice sense of place, and her descriptions of the school and other geographic settings are compelling, while the secondary story, which centers upon Alex's childhood, a tragic relationship with a friend and his father's downfall, is nicely drawn. Those who like moody British-based academic thrillers may find this is their cup of tea, but those not positively inclined toward excessive navel-gazing and a slow, deliberate plot will find it boring.

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April 1, 2013

Dymott's debut novel opens with the crime: Rachel, the beautiful, intelligent wife of Alex (a lawyer and the book's narrator), has been killed on the campus of Worchester College, Oxford University, after an alumni dinner. As Alex picks through his memories of Rachel, which may not be reliable, and follows up on leads into the mystery of her death, Dymott submerges her readers into Alex's grief and guilt. This moody, atmospheric literary mystery, along with its academic setting, brings to mind similar novels such as Donna Tartt's The Secret History. At times, the plot seems overly long and drawn out. In the end, however, Dymott's beautiful prose and the elegant, measured nature of the plot should satisfy readers who hang in until the end. VERDICT Recommended for those who enjoy literary thrillers and mystery novels, and fans of authors such as Tartt and Ian McEwan.--Amy Hoseth, Colorado State Univ. Lib., Fort Collins

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2013
Much like Donna Tartt's The Secret History (1992), Dymott's debut novel is set in academia and features a neurotic group of friends. Alex Petersen, a successful lawyer and graduate of Worcester College, Oxford, is in the grip of grief after his young wife, Rachel, is killed during a school reunion. As Alex investigates her murder, becoming more well acquainted with her mentor, caring English professor Harry, and her aloof and difficult aunt, Evie, Alex realizes that he didn't really know his wife. She had complicated dealings with the other two students in her Browning seminar, composed of equal parts scholarship and debauchery, and he suddenly realizes that she went to great lengths to keep him in the dark about the nature of her relationships. Dymott proves skillful on a number of fronts, including conjuring the mysteries of human nature and the cloistered environment of an elite university, but this novel would have been twice as good at half the length. Still, the author's deft evocation of mood and place marks her as a writer to watch.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)