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"Martin, don't ever call me sweetheart again."
I'm sure you have heard me rave about Hilary Davidson before. See, I have this theory that women may be fewer than men in crime fiction, but are a lot better in general and Davidson is part of this argument. The adventures of her recurring protagonist Lily Moore both have the aesthetic vintage appeal of a mid-century movie and extremely thorough character psychology, which makes it quite unique. I won't lie, I was a little worried about the third volume EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES, mainly because the title was corny, compared to the previous two, THE DAMAGE DONE and THE NEXT ONE TO FALL. I feared that it would betray a form of creative exhaustion. My concerns turned out to be as shallow as my judgment criteria because EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES is noticeably better than its two predecessors and that says A LOT, because Hilary Davidson always sets such a high quality standard for herself.
This time, Lily is on the job. She travels to Acapulco, Mexico on a press trip to Hotel Céron, a beautiful yet remote resort destination along with several other travel writers. Over there, she meets her colleague Skye McDermott, who seems to be off her rocker. She cries in Lily's arms, talks about an abstract vengeance over a boyfriend of her, a piece she's writing and then vanishes. Lily seems to be the only one worried about her and begins doing what she does best, investigate. She soon finds out a cornerstone of Skye's investigation and something that ties her into the big picture. The hotel she's in belongs to her ex-boyfriend Martin Sklar's corporation Pantheon and is managed by his right arm Gavin Stroud. Lily can't catch a break. As soon as she went back to work after the events of THE NEXT ONE TO FALL, she stumbles into a mindfuck of Olympic magnitude. Poor Lily!
What amazes me about the Lily Moore series is this capacity Hilary Davidson has to completely break free with whatever direction she's been going and still go somewhere relevant. A big part of EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES appeal is that it's so much different from THE DAMAGE DONE and THE NEXT ONE TO FALL. The first one was a family tragedy on an epic scale and the second volume was more of a straightforward misery, featuring a character who was sitll picking up parts of herself and EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES goes into the opposite direction, casting the doubt on Lily that someone she still cares about has been associated with atrocities. It explores untapped issues of an already strong and magnificent lead character.
The face that stared back at me from the mirror was a lot like my sister's; with the clammy pallor, it wasn't unlike Claudia's when she was sick with longing for a fix of heroin. Are you giving up already? a voice in my head demanded.
Another surprising and satisfying aspect of EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES is the depth of its psychological approach. Lily always battled with her ghosts, but its not until this book that they threaten to get the best of her. Someone in Hotel Céron is messing with Lily's mind and on top of finding her friend Skye, she has to worry about losing it. To say EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES is Lynchian would be stretching it a bit, but it has that psychological messes-with-the-founding-principles-of-your-identity thing that I haven't seen so well executed since the days of Alfred Hitchcock. Fans of the series like me will appreciate the ghastly, beautiful scene where Lily stumbles in the bathroom, thinking she's being poisoned, and reminds herself of her dead junkie sister Claudia while staring in the mirror.
EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES goes deeper into Lily Moore's mind than its two predecessors and shows a more fragile part of her. She's alone, fighting an invisible yet omnipresent enemy and she's struggling to keep her own issues bottled up at the same time. This wouldn't have been possible if Hilary Davidson wouldn't have come up with that airtight plot, which has the potency to rival the all-time great suspense fiction. If there was an issue with the Lily Moore novels before it's that they were a little loose plot-wise because they focused so much on character. They were a little solipsistic. But this is obviously over. EVIL IN ALL ITS DISGUISES is a breakout mystery novel if I've ever seen one. An amazing, Hitchcockian mystery that transcends the highest quality standards of crime fiction.
FIVE STARS