A Place of Hiding
by Elizabeth George
Hodder & Stoughton, £18.99, pp. 576, ISBN 034076709X
Blacklist
by Sara Paretsky
Hamish Hamilton, £12.99, pp. 432, ISBN 0241141885
I have in front of me three novels, all of which are over 400 pages long. Their average length, in fact, is 482 pages and their average weight is 783g. A Place of Hiding is Elizabeth George’s 12th novel. Blacklist is Sara Paretsky’s 12th novel. And Blow Fly is the 12th Scarpetta novel (although Patricia Cornwell has written a total of 18 books). So from three authors we have a total of 42 books which, if you bought the lot, might easily cost approximately £800, weigh in at a total of around 20kg, and number 16,000 pages at a conservative estimate. That’s just three authors.
These books are long, heavy and expensive, but on the plus side they are described as ‘absorbing’, ‘irresistibly compelling’, ‘shocking’ and ‘frightening’.
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