SIDNEY SHELDON'S THE TIDES OF MEMORY
by Tilly Bagshawe
The idle rich and the politically connected meet.
The novel is a blend of romance and intrigue, with smatterings of from-the-headlines topicality: A middle-aged British woman who has risen to power in the government gets herself in hot water (and thus “couldn’t look at water without feeling a shudder of foreboding”), while the mates of the (perhaps) falsely accused lad on whose shoulders she has risen and nearly fallen swear that she’ll get hers. Meanwhile, across the waters, callous young men are enjoying lobster rolls while trolling on daddy’s yacht and dreaming of “satin crotchless panties.” Natch, these worlds have to meet. The writing is true to formula and makes a good simulacrum of Sheldon’s well-known ham-fistedness: “Not only were Patel’s supporters threatening and aggressive, but the tabloid press, and in particular the Daily Mail, wittered on about the man as if he were Ghandi.” (Presumably, they’re twittering on about him as if he were Gandhi, but no matter.) Worse: “She was so nervous, her teeth began to chatter.” Worse yet: “Summer felt her tiredness lift and her misery of only a few hours ago evaporate like raindrops in the sun.”
Suitable for readers with middling hopes and low expectations but much inferior to other genre peers, Patterson included.