The Lake House - Kate Morton

I’ve read all of Kate Morton’s books. I love the way they take me into a world and lifestyle I’ve never known with a satisfying juxtaposition of the tranquility of surroundings and environment and the unsettling. sometimes, violent events.

And I did enjoy this recent novel. But a disturbing thought has wormed its way into my consciousness with this book. It was as if I had already read it, I knew what was going to happen despite the  numerous red herrings trying to lead me down the wrong path. And I wondered why. Has Ms. Morton lot her touch? But I don’t think it is that at all. I think it may be that in a sense familiarity breeds contempt. 

It strikes me that, because I enjoy these books so much and the writer’s style resonates with me so well that I am in tune with the way Kate Morton’s fiction mind works that there’s nothing new for me anymore. I think the way she thinks!! If this was the first Morton book I had read I would probably be ecstatically extolling its many virtues. 

So now I’m trying to think whether the same experience has happened to any of my other favourite writers.  I’m thinking first of Donna Tartt because I just loved The Goldfinch, I was less enthusiastic about The Secret History and The Little Friend but was it because I had adjusted to Tartt’s style.

Don’t get me wrong I thought all the books were fabulous and I can’t wait for either her or Kate Morton to write another and I’ll read them but this experience has raised questions about a response to a favourite writer.

But, back to The Lake House. As always it has a carefully and well structured plot with the familiar themes of love and passion, secret and mysteries. The characters are well drawn, familiar, as they possess all the flaws and weaknesses we see in ourselves as well as the strengths that carry us through the challenges the world throws at us. Compassion is a key theme in this book too. I enjoyed the parallels between the two stories, the contemporary one and the historical one. I think it was overlong and that might be off-putting to some readers.

But I will await Kate Morton’s next book with interest and see how I feel about that!! Watch this space. :-D