The Missing One

by Lucy Atkins

Paperback

Published January 16, 2014

About the author

Lucy Atkins is an award-winning author and journalist. Her bestseller, MAGPIE LANE, is a literary mystery set in an Oxford College, and was chosen as a Book of the Year by the Guardian, The Telegraph, Good Housekeeping magazine and Radio 4's Open Book. THE NIGHT VISITOR has been optioned for television. Her latest novel, WINDMILL HILL has been described as 'a triumph' by Philip Pullman and was a Summer Books 2023 pick in The Guardian and The Observer.

Lucy teaches on the Creative Writing Masters degree at Oxford University. She is a book critic for The Sunday Times, the Guardian, and other publications. She has also written several non-fiction books, including the Amazon #1 parenting bestseller, First-Time Parent (Collins, 2008).


Instagram @lucyatkinswriter (includes Free Live Creative Writing Classes)
www.lucyatkins.com

Reviews

[Hilary G · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't enjoy this one as much as the last book I read by the same writer, although it was potentially a really good story. I don't always let implausibility put me off fiction which, after all, doesn’t claim to be true, but there are limits. This time, there were just too many occasions where I said to myself "As if," and this undermined the aspects of the story that were excellent. The best parts of all were the parts about the orcas. This was all interesting and educational, and often very moving. I once went to Seaworld in San Diego and saw orcas performing tricks. This both upset me and made me angry and I have remained opposed to the capture of animals and the training of them to perform for human amusement. How can we justify it in the light of our knowledge of all of which we have deprived these creatures?
In the last Atkins book I read (Magpie Lane), the single viewpoint was used to really good effect, to pose questions and leave the reader to try and deduce the answers. In this book, there wasn't exactly a single viewpoint, but the sort of stream of consciousness of Kali got a bit tedious, and actually didn't necessarily comprehensively reveal what she was like. There were a few sparse chapters that were recounted from Elena's point of view, but as that was all historical, not comprehensive either. The communications between Kali and her father, and Kali and her sister were sometimes intrusive being a mere repetition of what we had already heard and really the book would have been not much different (though possibly tighter and better) without them. The story did throw up some interesting questions - does having children make it impossible for a mother to fulfil her dreams? Would Elena have been able to fulfil hers despite having children if things had turned out differently? And how should we judge Elena, Gray, Suzanne? I like stories that pose questions, even if I don't know the answers. Despite the negative things I have mentioned, this was still a jolly good read. Family history is one of my passions, so this story was always going to interest me.