Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 8, 1990 TAG: 9007080239
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: D4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Reviewed by SHARYN McCRUMB
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
If you really want to enrage authors, ask them what name they write under. (As in: "What name do you write under, Mr. Clancy?")
Generally speaking, with the exception of romance novelists and British physicians, writers use their real names. Occasionally, an author uses more than one name, and that is an indication that she has become famous for one sort of book, but now wishes to publish another type of fiction. It puts the reader on notice to expect a different book.
Barbara Vine is the second voice of British crime novelist Ruth Rendell.
She calls it her more feminine side, because the Vine novels study human relationships and obsessive love. Feminine in this case does not mean a kinder, gentler fiction. Barbara is as dark and penetrating as her alter ego; it is only the focus that changes. Many of the Rendell novels are police procedurals, examining brutal crimes from the safety of a moral center, the character of Inspector Wexford, a good and intelligent policeman.
Barbara Vine's books contain only shades of gray; no one represents Good, and love is not necessarily a positive force. In "A Dark Adapted Eye," she examines the effects of a woman's domineering love for her younger sister. "The House of Stairs" depicts a community of artists who love and destroy their eccentric patron.
"Gallowglass," the latest Vine novel, focuses on a reverse hostage syndrome. The kidnapper falls in love with his victim, continuing his obsession even after she has been released and started a new life. The title word, gallowglass, is an old Celtic term for the bodyguard of the chieftain. It was he who tasted his laird's food and stood beside him in battle, ready to place himself in the path of an axe or spear.
Joe, the narrator, is a disturbed young man with suicidal tendencies. He becomes obsessed with Sandor, the stranger who pulls him from the path of a train. He insists that his love for Sandor is not sexual, and he seizes on the idea of the gallowglass to explain his feelings.
Sandor's love is given elsewhere, to a beautiful and aristocratic woman he calls "the Princess." His obsession is to kidnap this woman, because he is convinced that she is unhappy in her present captivity - marriage to a wealthy old man who keeps her in a high-tech fortress.
The other gallowglass is Paul Garnet, who has been hired to serve as the Princess' bodyguard. His loyalty is a matter of honor, but completely impersonal. Sandor's obsession fuels the lives of everyone else, causing a confrontation that can only end in tragedy.
Barbara Vine has a gift for making her characters seem perfectly real and plausible, but these sad people are less interesting than her other creations. Still, "Gallowglass" is a well-written and illuminating study of dark love.
by CNB