View source for The Gilded Ones by Brooke Fieldhouse

{{infobox1
|title=The Gilded Ones
|sort=Gilded Ones
|author=Brooke Fieldhouse
|reviewer=Sue Magee
|genre=Crime
|summary=An elegantly-written piece of fiction which rises above the usual genre writing. There's an excellent evocation of time and place from an author to watch.
|rating=4
|buy=Yes
|borrow=Yes
|pages=240
|publisher=Troubador Publishing
|date=June 2018
|isbn=978-1789013993
|website=https://twitter.com/brookebfa
|cover=1789013992
|aznuk=1789013992
|aznus=1789013992
}}

It was a hot day in 1984 and Pulse had two job interviews for the day, but the heat wasn't the only reason why he wasn't feeling on top form.  He'd had a disturbing dream the night before.  He'd been following a Porsche on a difficult route, probably somewhere in the Alps when the Porsche went off the road.  The passenger, a man, was dead, but the woman was still alive.  ''I'm Freia...'', she said.  ''It's spelled the German way.''  Of the two job interviews, the first was with an up-and-coming design studio in Brighton and it would almost certainly be good for Pulse's career.  The second was with a run-down practice based in an old London house and headed by Patrick Lloyd-Lewis, whose wife, Freia, had recently died in unexplained circumstances.  The link with the dream of the night before was too much for Pulse to refuse the offer of a job.  He couldn't resist the lure of the mystery.

I'll confess to having been a little reluctant to start reading ''The Gilded Ones''.  The problem was the final two words of the book's description on Amazon: ''disturbingly gothic''.  The portentously horrifying doesn't worry me, but too often - and in the hands of a debut novelist - it's an excuse for sloppy plotting and characterisation.  I needn't have worried though:  Brooke Fieldhouse might be a debut author, but there's nothing sloppy about this book.  The writing is classy and the book rises above the usual genre offerings. 

The choice of a design studio as the setting is inspired: Fieldhouse has a background in the business and it shows in the writing.  This doesn't come from someone who's collected a few choice phrases to give the right impression: it comes from a writer who obviously knows a great deal more about the subject than needs to be put on paper.

I spent a lot of time in London in the eighties and Fieldhouse has it perfectly.  Not only that, but it was done effortlessly: there are no crude signposts as to period, but as you read you know that it couldn't be any other time.  Characterisation too is excellent.  Pulse is working class: he's not ''quite'' out of his depth in the Lloyd-Lewis practice, but there's a feeling of separateness, that he's not quite one of them, no matter what attempts are made to make it look otherwise.  We're not short changed on any of the characters: even those who appear only briefly are completely fleshed out.  The dialect was ''perhaps'' over done in places, but that's a very minor quibble.

The plot is slow burn: if you're looking for a book with plenty of action then it might not be the one for you.  On the other hand, if you're searching for a psychological crime drama, elegantly written and with plenty of plot twists then you'll feel more than adequately rewarded by this book.  I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to the Bookbag.

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[[Category:Literary Fiction]]