The High Flyer (Paperback)

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Amazon.co.uk Review
"When I first saw my temporary secretary it never occurred to me to flirt with him". The bemused confidence and upended assumption of this first sentence from The High Flyer, by Susan Howatch, reveal a great deal about the character who speaks it and the shape of this novel as a whole. The narrator, Carter Graham, is a successful London lawyer--a "high flyer"--whose thoroughly secular plan for a perfect life (clothes, car, kids, etc.) is proceeding quite punctually, thanks to her strong sense of entitlement and her talent for social manipulation. The story that follows, however, undermines Carter's confident assumptions regarding the inner lives of the people around her. Carter meets and marries another high flyer, a charming business titan named Kim. Slowly, Carter learns of Kim's involvement in the occult, his Nazi past and the suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of his former wife. As the mysteries of Kim's past are revealed to Carter, Kim's personality undergoes a deep and demonic transformation. Carter, terrified, seeks shelter at a Christian healing centre, where a cast of clerics and lay people help Carter reconstruct a life for herself, and a theological and psychological framework that makes some sense of the blindness and betrayal that destroyed her life with Kim. "[C]reation's not about efficiency", explains one character, "it's about love. It's about shedding blood, sweat and tears to make the thing you care about come right. It's about enduring the shadow side of creation and using it so that in the end everything can be brought into the light". The novel's greatest strength is its suspenseful plotting, which calls to mind (thanks in part to the narrator's frequent allusions to) the films of Alfred Hitchcock.. --Michael Joseph Gross

Review
I picked up her latest, THE HIGH FLYER, and put it down only to start the preceding one. The woman's brilliant" You Magazine. "Unputdownable.hugely ambitious" Daily Express "Howatch's skills as a novelist are consummate: her characters and her contexts live.One of the bravest books I've read" Church Times

The author's six-volume 'Starbridge' series analysing the (sometimes outrageous) behaviour of the upper-echelons of the Christian Church caused a sensation when it was first published, and has resonated in the memories of all who read it. Her last novel: A Question of Integrity moved closer to the outer fringes of religious experience and 'healing', and this latest one goes even further into the world of the less-reputable exponents and hangers-on who perpetrate not only dubious practises, but some which are - to use one of their own words - 'evil'. Carter Graham, the legal High Flyer of the title has (like so many young women today) 'got it all' - apart from a fashionable and rich husband, and children. The man she chooses seems perfect - but outward appearances are deceitful (like Kim Betz himself) and Carter soon finds herself in very deep water indeed. Your reviewed also found herslef in deep water, needing every scrap of her suspension-of-disbelief to carry her through to the end. Those with a strong interest in the paranormal and psychic phenomena are likeliest to find it enthralling. Sceptics might be less responsive. (Kirkus UK)

Good and evil clash in gripping, intellectually satisfying ways as Howatch (The Wonder Worker, 1997, etc.) charts the spiritual crises provoked by disturbing revelations and encounters with a sinister `psychic healer` in the City of London, where money is God and work is religionRevisiting the same terrain she explored in The Wonder Worker, and featuring familiar characters like Nicholas Darrow, Lewis Hall, and Alice Fletcher, Howatch introduces tough-talking Carter Graham, a high-powered City lawyer who thinks she has her whole life planned outa belief that invites disaster once she marries Kim Betz, another apparently successful high flyer. Carter, whose father's debts led to her familys eviction and her parents divorce, had vowed her life would be different. But as Kim's first wife, Sophie, tries futilely to contact her, Carter learns that Kim has lied and his past was even more wounding than hers. His father was a Nazi, not a Jewish refugee as he told her, and when she meets Kims malevolent healer, Mrs. Mayfield, who dabbles in blackmail and the occult, she finds out he has been involved in a murder, plus kinky sex rituals. Convinced now that Sophie is trying to help, Carter heads to Sophie's home, only to discover her dead. Then Carters apartment is vandalized and she thinks she sees Sophie's ghost. Frightened of committing suicide, as Mrs. Mayfield suggested she might, Carter flees to the church whose rector is the brother of her handsome personal assistant. Taken to the Healing Center of St. Benet, a skeptical Carter begins a painful search for truth and meaning. Yet before she reaches that moment of saving grace and insight, she must first face both her past and Kim's.Vivid and absorbing dispatches from one of the best correspondents on the war between darkness and light. Another winner. (Kirkus Reviews)

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13 Reviews 5 star:  (5) 4 star:  (2) 3 star:  (3) 2 star:  (1) 1 star:  (2)           Average Customer Review 3.5 out of 5 stars (13 customer reviews)		Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews   6 of 6 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Howatch consistently touches my heart with her work., 17 Jul 2001 By A Customer I've read this book 3 times since it was published, as I do all Howatch's books. This novel gives us yet another twist on Nicholas and his coterie that is compelling and thoughtful, but also fun to read. Her books on the church consistently speak to me in a way that nothing else about Christianity does. Because of her, I'm becoming a "closet" Christian! I wish the Christians I've encountered were more like her characters -- real people with problems but also with integrity and commitment to something greater than themselves. When they are portrayed as rigid or stiff necked, the plot usually involves a BIG dose of humility accompanied by a change in perspective. These novels inspired me to expand my reading to include Farrer, Underhill, Julian of Norwich, and The Cloud of Unknowing. I check every week to see if she's got a new book coming out -- hope it's soon! Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   3 of 3 people found the following review helpful: 2.0 out of 5 stars Starbridge falling, 20 Dec 2001 By A Customer To those of us who have read,and thoroughly enjoyed,the Starbridge novels in their entirety,this latest meeting with Darrow and Co will come as a great disappointment.The subtelty and mystique that kept us all rivetted to her earlier novels is completely absent in this book,and the theological eplanations and reasoning tend "take over" the narrative for the last hundred pages or so. Not worthy of the Starbridge catagory at all. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   3 of 3 people found the following review helpful: 3.0 out of 5 stars Excellent continuation of the Starbridge series, 15 Jul 2001 By A Customer This book is a continuation of Howatch's Starbridge series. Although Carter Graham can at times be an irritating protagonist, this is a valid attempt at exploring the culture clash between the worlds of work and career, and the worlds of spiritual understanding and knowledge. For those ( like me ) who have read Howatch's previous books, it is a pleasure to meet again her main characters of Nicholas Darrow and Alice, a few years on from "A Question of Integrity". The most moving passage of this book is Carter's flight from her flat, through the streets of London, searching for sanctuary. Even if you don't enjoy the book's attempt at describing theology by using conversation - read this passage. It's worth it. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this) Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review › See all 13 customer reviews...		Ad feedback   Most Recent Customer Reviews 3.0 out of 5 stars High Flyer I was bought this book as a present for Christmas and put it to the back of my "pile" for reading as I was convinced it was not my sort of book. Read more Published on 28 Feb 2003 by roonetta 4.0 out of 5 stars A throughly good book and rather thought provoking. I enjoyed this book immensely. I particulary liked the way Howatch's shows how fragile people can be and the way that even when we are at what may seem like the best times of our... Read more Published on 15 Jul 2001 by M. E. Spencer 1.0 out of 5 stars A book I made myself finish This had the potential to be a good story but the main character was unbelievably irritating - I thought I would scream if I read the word "flufette" (her word for girly... Read more Published on 26 April 2001 1.0 out of 5 stars Dire This book is lame for a number of reasons. The narration flows terribly. It's boring in a nutshell, but it's so bad you'll keep reading to see if it gets any better or any more... Read more Published on 20 Mar 2001 5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable and thought provoking This is the first book by Susan Howatch that I have read, and now I am in the process of finding her other books to read. Read more Published on 7 Mar 2001 3.0 out of 5 stars A book of two parts This book had me spellbound and I couldn't put it down and would have given it 5 stars, that was until I reached part 5!! What a waste of paper!! Read more Published on 23 Oct 2000 5.0 out of 5 stars This will probably one of my favorite Howatch books. Carter and Kim are so difficult to like that I found the first few chapters difficult to get into. However Susan Howatch is a master story teller and once she revealed that... Read more Published on 21 Nov 1999 5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent melding of previous "phases" in her writing career This was a typical Susan Howatch novel. Never the less, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Susan tends to write a book with many insights into personality issues. Read more Published on 12 Nov 1999 by Gary Branson 5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent melding of previous "phases" in her writing career This was a typical Susan Howatch novel. Never the less, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Susan tends to write a book with many insights into personality issues. Read more Published on 12 Nov 1999 by Gary Branson 4.0 out of 5 stars Too dogmatic about religion (for my taste) I would like to say that Susan Howatch is my number 1 author and I have never so far been disappointed by any of her books. Read more Published on 26 Oct 1999 Search Customer Reviews Only search this product's reviews › See all 13 customer reviews...

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