Nora Roberts’ High Noon: Will Love Save the Day?

Review by Chris Manson August 23, 2007 Issue

Guys, I have to confess. I liked the new Nora Roberts novel High Noon. I had never been moved to read this prolific author in the past, but I figured I’d give this one 15 pages, cast it aside, and move on to Bentley Little’s new spine tingler. But that opening sentence is a grabber—“Jumping to your death was a crappy way to spend St. Patrick’s Day” — and it just keeps getting more involving. So stop snickering at your wife’s — or girlfriend’s or mother’s or grandmother’s — favorite writer and give the old gal a try.

Roberts is usually consigned to the romance section of the bookshops, and with titles like Private Scandals and True Betrayals to her credit, that makes a certain amount of sense. There’s romance in High Noon to be sure, but also a generous amount of suspense. If there is in fact a romantic crime fiction genre, Roberts seems as likely to be crowned its queen as any author.

Lieutenant Phoebe McNamara is a hostage negotiator with the Savannah, Ga. police. She’s divorced and lives in a big old townhouse with her seven-year-old daughter and reclusive mother. Phoebe also has a younger brother who shares the childhood trauma that led our heroine to her chosen profession.

The novel begins by illustrating Phoebe’s considerable negotiating skills when she is called to talk a man out of leaping to his death. Turns out the jumper’s former employer is a handsome and understanding charmer named Duncan Swift (!). True to his surname, Swift falls hard for Phoebe, but with all the complications and baggage in her life, our guy has a tough row to hoe.

While instructing a class on proper hostage negotiation procedures, Phoebe is harassed by a misogynist police officer who seems to have been modeled after the Shane character from television’s The Shield. After getting a dressing-down from his superior, the rogue cop brutally assaults Phoebe right there in the stairwell of police headquarters. The future poster boy for anger management training loses his badge and his policeman father’s respect and is reduced to taking a job as a jewelry store security guard. It’s not long before Phoebe is harassed and stalked, but the villain isn’t the creep that we—or Phoebe — suspect.

The relationships between Phoebe and the other characters are believable and often poignant. The mother-daughter stuff—Phoebe and her child’s pizza and DVD nights, Phoebe dealing with her mother’s fear of the outside world—are well crafted. Roberts is not afraid to slow down the plot wheels to allow her characters to breathe and get under our skin. There’s also plenty of snappy dialogue and romantic interludes that ring true. Fans of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil will appreciate some of the scenic touches, particularly a cameo by a Julia Roberts look-alike with a prominent Adam’s apple and a husky voice.

The segments involving police procedure are convincing, too. Rather than opt for some boneheaded James Patterson twist, Roberts lets the story play out in a way that does not insult the reader. Her greatest skill is that she keeps you turning the pages. Like the Fred Zinnemann film from which High Noon steals its title, the events culminate in an effectively tense showdown between good and evil. But Phoebe is no Gary Cooper—her friends, family and new beau are always in her corner.

So keep on snickering, fellas. I can be a bit of a cynic, too. I’ve been burned a few times, but I’m always ready to be kicked in the butt by love once more. I was pleasantly surprised by my first excursion into the Roberts bibliography, though it will probably be a long time before I decide to catch up on all of her straight-to-paperback quickies.

G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 467 pages. Available from booksellers and local libraries.

(Top)

More Book Reviews