Innocent Blood - P. D. James ***

By Brian Clegg

This is an unusual novel from the late, great mystery writer P. D. James, first published in 1980. It is arguably a murder mystery in the sense of it’s a novel that involves a murder and has some twists – but it is anything but a traditional mystery novel and does not feature James’ detective Adam Dalgliesh at all (despite the US version being described as an Adam Dalgliesh mystery).

What we get instead is something between a Greek tragedy and a modern soap opera. This might seem an odd juxtaposition – but soap operas these days tend to put characters into terrible situations far more than the older kitchen sink versions. The main character in the book, Philippa Palfrey, is 18 and adopted (and possibly a sociopath). She feels she needs to know about her birth parents to discover who she is – but discovers that they were jailed for the rape and murder of a child. Her birth father is dead, but her mother is (conveniently) about to be released from jail. Add in the father of the murdered child, who has dedicated his life to killing Philip’s birth mother on her release and we get all the elements required for such a tragedy.

It’s an elegantly agonising scenario, brilliantly conceived. But I found a large chunk of it painfully slow – which is why I can only give it three stars. It’s a novel in three acts. The opening one, where the situation is set up is excellent, as is the closing one, where everything comes to a conclusion with a couple of twists. But the long middle section spends far too long for me exploring the minutiae of Philippa’s gradually getting to know her birth mother, the child’s father planning his revenge, and (particularly) Philippa’s adoptive mother living with her inadequacy. 

All of this probably does work well as a literary novel – but I can’t help but come at this with the expectation of a mystery writer’s tight plotting and exposition, which really isn’t there in that central section. Still a worthwhile read for any P. D. James lover, but decidedly an oddity.

See all of Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly digest for free here

Now Appearing is the blog of science writer Brian Clegg (www.brianclegg.net), author of Inflight Science, Before the Big Bang and The God Effect.