Borrowed Time

From Library Journal

Long ago, Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) totally hoodwinked this reviewer, who has since been suspicious of any mystery written in the first person. This distrust was intensified by Nicholas Farrell’s seemingly innocent interpretation of Robin Timariot, the protagonist of Borrowed Time. Is he the honest, ingenuous Englishman he seems? Or is he capable of complex lies, rape, and murder? Farrell’s outstanding reading is as ambiguous as the story is layered. Initially, his neutral tones introduce a colorless, joyless government employee. Yet Timariot meets a lovely woman on the evening of her murder, and his emotions are stirred by her beauty and, later, by horror at hearing of her rape and murder. Even though he is unable to adequately explain his obsession with the dead woman and her family, his subsequent involvement in their lives brings some meaning to his. Farrell unobtrusively effects this transformation by orally coloring Timariot with shades of admiration, anger, disgust, disappointment, embarrassment, and concern. Mystery fans will appreciate this recording’s characterization, plot, and performance. Recommended.
Juleigh Muirhead Clark, Coll. of William & Mary, Williamsburg, Va.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Description

It is a golden evening of high summer in July 1990. Robin Timariot has set out that morning on what he has planned as a six-day tramp along part of Offa’s Dyke. At the close of his first day’s walk he encounters an elegant middle-aged woman who seems strangely out of place among the sheep and gorse of Hergest Ridge. They exchange only a few words of conversation, but their talk is enigmatic — and unforgettable. A few days later, at the end of his walk, Timariot returns home to learn from the newspapers that, just a few hours after their meeting, the woman, whose name was Louise Paxton, was raped and then murdered, along with an artist, Oscar Bantock, who lived near by.

A man is swiftly charged and convicted of the crime, but a string of inexplicable events begins to convince Timariot — and others — that all is not what it seems. Timariot, fascinated by Louise Paxton’s memory, is drawn irresistibly into the complex motives and relationships of her family and friends, searching against his better judgement for the secret of what really happened on the day she died.

The closer he gets to the truth, the more hideous and uncertain it seems to be. And far too late he realizes that it may threaten many powerful people. So much so that anybody who uncovers it is unlikely to be allowed to live.

From Publishers Weekly

First published in the UK in 1995, this psychological thriller has a that plot springs from the chance encounter between English businessman Robin Timariot and Lady Louise Paxton, who meet briefly while hiking near Wales. Hours later, Paxton is found raped and strangled in a nearby cottage. Over the proceeding months and years, Timariot watches as a drifter get convicted of the murder and the Paxton family disintegrates into rivalries, suicides and tensions owing to the crime. Meanwhile, Timariot, heir to a cricket bat manufacturing company, must navigate his own family squabbles, fueled in part by the company’s lagging position in the marketplace. As with many of his 16 novels (Dying to Tell, etc.), Goddard’s plotting is a smooth mix of secrets, deceits and slowly unfolding horrors.
Copyright Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Excerpt. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Chapter One

It began more than three years ago, on a golden evening of high summer. I’d started out from Knighton that morning on what was projected to be a six-day tramp along the southern half of Offa’s Dyke. I’ve always found I think best when walking alone. And since I had a great deal to think about at the time, a really long walk seemed one way of ensuring I thought clearly and well. Decis