Review
Like many of its ilk
The Savage
Garden combines two mysteries in one, one
ancient and one modern. It's late Spring 1958; Adam
Banting, an intelligent but callow history of art
student, has yet to choose a thesis subject for his
final exam the following year, so is delighted to
take up his professor's suggestion that he spend
part of his summer researching a Renaissance villa
in Tuscany, which can then form the basis of his
thesis. Shortly after, Adam sets off for a summer
that (we know from the prologue) will change him
forever.
Mills embroiders themes of passion, survival and
divided family loyalties into a plot as deft and as
civilized as the setting.
The Savage Garden
is easily on a par with other recent high brow...
Beyond the Book
Mark Mills is a novelist
and screenwriter whose credits
include the screenplay for
The Reckoning, which he
adapted from Barry Unsworth's
novel
Morality Play. His
first novel,
Amagansett,
set in the small
Long Island town of the same
name in 1947, was published in
the USA in 2004. In some
countries, including the UK, it is
titled
The Whaleboat House.
Described by one reviewer as
Snow Falling on Cedars meets
The Shipping News,
Amagansett won the Crime
Writer's of America John Creasey...
