Delusion

by Peter Abrahams

Book Overview

A woman's world is turned upside down when new evidence frees a man she put in prison with her testimony years ago in this latest ingenious thriller from the author Publishers Weekly calls "one of the best contemporary thriller writers around."

Twenty years ago Nell Jarreau witnessed the murder of her boyfriend. Her testimony put a man behind bars--and led her to her husband, Clay, the gentle detective who solved the case. They've been happy...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061137995
• ISBN13: 9780061137990
• Release Date: April 2008
• Publisher: William Morrow & Company
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.26 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Reeled In

Nell Jarreau is a 30-something woman with what appears to be a storybook life: a loving, passionate marriage; a daughter on the college track, a beautiful home and a fulfilling career. Her life begins to unravel in the aftermath of a locally devastating hurricane when evidence is uncovered in a twenty-year-old murder case in which she was the primary witness for the prosecution. It is fascinating to watch Nell's attempts to deny, yet absorb, the damning facts that reveal themselves in this suspenseful novel. The author's insight into the mind of the falsely-convicted yet not innocent defendant is compelling. And the inner tension of Nell's husband due to the part he has played in the false conviction comes through without need for sidebars or explanations. I picked this book up because it was the first one on the shelf in the New Book section and don't have a moment's regret.

Stick with it. It's worth the wait.

This one starts slow but I've read many Peter Abrahams books and I know I like his writing so I stuck with it and it was worth it. By the end I was gasping out loud. Maybe not his absolute best but definitely worth reading :)

Past is Prologue

Friendship can lead to all kinds of results, as this suspense novel proves. Moreover, the consequences can not only be unanticipated, but lead to more complications than the human mind can conceive. But this author does a pretty good job of conjuring up as many as he can think of. About 20 years before the story takes place, Nell Jarreau was strolling along the bayou with her boyfriend when they were attacked by a masked man demanding money. The boyfriend was then knifed and murdered. Nell kicked the attacker and the mask fell for a moment, giving her a glimpse of the man's face. Based on her ID, a man was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. A year later, she married one of the detectives, who, as the story is told, is now the Chief of Police, both apparently living happily until a telephone call changes everything. As a result of hurricane damage, a tape is found exonerating the apparently falsely incarcerated convict. Nell feels guilty about having sent an innocent man to prison, but her memory of the attack is at best hazy, and she goes about attempting to investigate the matter. She meets with the released man, tries hypnosis and attempts to find the truth. Before the reader can reach the end of this well-paced novel, there is a dearth of clues pointing one to a logical conclusion. Yet the ending is consistent with the single earlier clue, and the characterizations are finely tuned. A well-written tale, and one which is recommended.

Not pulse-pounding suspense, but worth the read

Peter Abrahams' Delusion is set in a suburb of New Orleans, Belle Ville, post-"Bernardine" (a stand-in for Katrina, though it's not clear why that change needed to be made). During the clean-up after the storm a file is found in a police locker that turns out to contain exculpatory evidence in an old case: twenty years earlier, Alvin Dupree had been convicted of the murder of a young scientist. He was positively identified in a line-up by the only eye witness to the crime, the victim's girlfriend Nell. She is now married to the detective who solved the case, who has since become Belle Ville's chief of police. The discovery of the evidence threatens to destroy Nell's world. At first dismissive of the find--she knows what she saw--she comes to doubt her senses and her memory, and finally questions whether the last twenty years of her life have been based on a lie. Delusion is a timely read, both because of the significance of "Bernardine" to the story and because the plot concerns the belated exoneration of a wrongly accused prisoner--not by DNA evidence in this case, but the parallels to the recent spate of overturned convictions based on genetic evidence are clear. The plot is complex, with numerous characters complicating one another's understanding of the facts by lying at various times, though when we finally learn the motive behind the twenty-year-old crime it seems a little too neat. Most impressively, Abrahams has created in Alvin Dupree a character who is both pathetic and menacing: he may not have killed Nell's boyfriend back in the day, but he is decidedly not the picture of an innocent man. Delusion doesn't offer pulse-pounding suspense. We're never scared for the characters, exactly, just a little worried now and then. But it's worth the read. -- Debra Hamel

entertaining crime thriller

Two decades ago in a courtroom, Nell Jarreau dramatically testified that Alvin "Pirate" DuPree murdered her boyfriend, Johnny Blanton wile she watched in horror. Pregnant with Johnny's offspring Nell married Clay, the chief detective on the homicide case, while Alvin went to prison. Twenty years later, due to the devastation of Hurricane Bernadine swamping Belle Ville, FEMA accidentally found tape evidence with a time code on it that affirms Alvin's alibi that he was at Nappy's Liquor Store. Nell is stunned as she is positive Alvin killed Johnny yet the evidence is otherwise conclusive. Clay, now the Belle Ville chief of police, cautions his wife to move on, but she is disturbed by her identifying an innocent man. The press has a field day as they dig into the Pirate's wrongful conviction case while Nell's daughter Norah seems even more negatively affected by the case than her. Guilt laden, Nell needs closure again so she decides to investigate. This is an entertaining crime thriller as readers wonder who killed Blanton if not Alvin. DuPree is a perfect "victim" as he is a nasty odious person who many in the audience will believe should remain incarcerated even if he did not commit the homicide as he probably did others anyway. Nell is the prime player, but she fails to come across as an amateur sleuth on an emotional quest to solve a cold case murder she witnessed. Still this is an enjoyable tale. Harriet Klausner