Joan C. Gidding

An Element of Doubt Joan C. Gidding

In, An Element of Doubt a predator is at large! A man as beautiful as Lucifer! Did the harsh mountains of Norway or a loveless childhood produce Per Norstadt, a man of many aliases who takes what he wants eliminating those in his way? He is without a conscience! Does he have a shadow? Always on the move he leaves a trail of murder from London to Paris, Cannes, Stamros, Rome and Zurich. Then, through Dana Sedgeton the novel is 'flashbacked' to an England in the aftermath of World War II, where ruinous taxes and death duties have 'beggared' the population, particularly the aristocracy, among them Sir Hugh and Lady Barbara Sedgeton who are affected but who manage to raise three children, one of them a 'ward', with courage, humor and dignity. Values do prevail. It is the 'ward' Sally Lassiter who meets Norstadt (alias Marc de Courcy) in Paris where she is studying; inadvertently, she leads him to meet young Stephanie Bishop whom he visits in England. Finally, 'Nemesis' waits! The reader might find the diversity of locales, food, fashion, customs interesting enough not to miss the banalities of ugly four-letter words and explicit sex. Subtlety refreshes!