Book Review: No Room for Doubt by Angela Dove
No Room for Doubt
by Angela Dove
Berkley Books trade paperback, 2009
Reviewed by: Kathryn Magendie
Angela Dove’s debut book No Room for Doubt is a true story of how “one violent moment can changes lives—forever.” If one expected Dove’s first book to be a humorous jaunt, one would be mistaken, even though Dove has been writing humor columns for six years. Yet when Jacque MacDonald asked Dove to write the story of her daughter’s murder and the hunt for her murderer, Dove took on this task knowing that what she may find could forever alter the relationship she has with her family, most particularly with her father, Harold Whitlock.
Although Dove’s book on the surface may center on Debi’s mother, the “butterfly effect” on family and friends cannot be ignored. I found that my interest focused on Dove and her father (who is a suspect in his wife’s murder). The father-daughter relationship that had been strong before the murder begins to fall apart as Harold’s other side is revealed to his daughter—a side Dove is not happy to know, one in which she struggles to compare with the man who has always been her hero. There is the revealing of the events of the crime, and finally, its criminal, but as well, there is the revealing of a man who has lost control of the world in which he needs to feel control over.
Yet one cannot ignore the ferocious determination in which Jacque single-mindedly focuses on finding the evil one who murdered her daughter. And, though suspicion is placed upon Debi’s husband Harold, Jacque is convinced someone else committed this crime. She will not stop until the killer is found, and indeed, she is still tirelessly working as an advocate for victims.
Excluding the introduction, the beginning pages of the book set up the events that occur hours before Debi’s death, up to when Harold finds his wife lying in the hallway with her throat slashed open, her naked body posed, her face covered. Harold has been at a bachelor’s party. There are questions about when he left the bar, where he was between bar and his mistress (and here Dove finds out just one of the secrets of her father previously unknown to her), how much time lapses that he cannot account for. His erratic behavior when the authorities arrive further pushes Harold into a negative spotlight. The reader wonders: did he do it?
When Jacque first learns of her daughter’s murder, she takes to her bed, unable to focus on anything but what her daughter’s last hours were, how afraid she must have been, and who could have done this to a woman everyone loved? But as her anger surfaces and takes hold, Jacque finds a core of strength, a determination to find out who took her beautiful girl from her, and from her now motherless granddaughter.
As the book progresses, the “crime drama” recedes and in intersecting chapters Dove gives readers glimpses into her and her father’s relationship, both past and as revealed. There is poignancy to Dove’s writing in these chapters, and it is here I found a strong and revealing voice, one that I would love to see Dove use again in another book. Though the writing is crisp and strong throughout the novel, in the chapters where Dove writes about her family, and herself, there is a strength and confidence to the language that I responded to.
Quite interesting is Harold Whitlock’s “character,” and I would read a book just based on this paradoxical man and his family. His tragedy is revealed in the pages of Dove’s book, and as one reads, one can see Whitlock begin to fade away as the days, then months, then years go by without a resolution to his wife’s murder, and the continuing suspicion surrounding him. It is as if the very life is sucked from Harold Whitlock, leaving behind but a shadow of the man Dove knew as her father—bigger than life, a man of many gifts.
Do not look for the clichéd television crime shows where the “Murder of the Week” is revealed in fast sensational clips, where cops find perpetrators quickly and accurately, where the line between “bad guys” and “good guys” is easily found. Instead, there are gentle moments, there are poignant moments, there are moments when Dove’s perplexed naivety are revealed and comparably where she is more Adult than the adults, where a young Dove must face a scrutiny most girls her age do not have to face, where a difficult and complex man begins to disappear into the very air he used to suck from the room just by the power of his presence. There is Jacque, who must choose the path she will take: Disappear, too, or Fight. Jacque fights. Indeed, it seems everyone goes on to fight their fight, live their lives, find their peace or place in the world; except for Harold Whitlock.
One wonders if these dark corners in Dove’s life are what led her to write humor? Or, is it the legacy her father gave her in the early days, with his sense of humor, wit, and intelligence?
Meanwhile, Jacque is not done. She is still working to keep Debi’s voice alive with “The Victim’s Voice,” and as well still working on “Debi’s Law.” One imagines she will continue this until her last breath—this is what she has of her daughter, this is what she carries with her in the place of the baby she once held, the girl she raised, the woman she loved and lost much too soon.
And as for Angela Dove? She has written “No Room For Doubt” and in those nooks and crannies and dark corners, she has faced what no daughter wants to face and in the process, Angela Dove must recover from losses of her own.
Angela Dove is an award-winning writer who enjoys crafting stories about the ups and downs of living as they present themselves in small humorous moments. Visit Angela Dove at http://www.angeladove.com/
by Angela Dove
Berkley Books trade paperback, 2009
Reviewed by: Kathryn Magendie
Angela Dove’s debut book No Room for Doubt is a true story of how “one violent moment can changes lives—forever.” If one expected Dove’s first book to be a humorous jaunt, one would be mistaken, even though Dove has been writing humor columns for six years. Yet when Jacque MacDonald asked Dove to write the story of her daughter’s murder and the hunt for her murderer, Dove took on this task knowing that what she may find could forever alter the relationship she has with her family, most particularly with her father, Harold Whitlock.
Although Dove’s book on the surface may center on Debi’s mother, the “butterfly effect” on family and friends cannot be ignored. I found that my interest focused on Dove and her father (who is a suspect in his wife’s murder). The father-daughter relationship that had been strong before the murder begins to fall apart as Harold’s other side is revealed to his daughter—a side Dove is not happy to know, one in which she struggles to compare with the man who has always been her hero. There is the revealing of the events of the crime, and finally, its criminal, but as well, there is the revealing of a man who has lost control of the world in which he needs to feel control over.
Yet one cannot ignore the ferocious determination in which Jacque single-mindedly focuses on finding the evil one who murdered her daughter. And, though suspicion is placed upon Debi’s husband Harold, Jacque is convinced someone else committed this crime. She will not stop until the killer is found, and indeed, she is still tirelessly working as an advocate for victims.
Excluding the introduction, the beginning pages of the book set up the events that occur hours before Debi’s death, up to when Harold finds his wife lying in the hallway with her throat slashed open, her naked body posed, her face covered. Harold has been at a bachelor’s party. There are questions about when he left the bar, where he was between bar and his mistress (and here Dove finds out just one of the secrets of her father previously unknown to her), how much time lapses that he cannot account for. His erratic behavior when the authorities arrive further pushes Harold into a negative spotlight. The reader wonders: did he do it?
When Jacque first learns of her daughter’s murder, she takes to her bed, unable to focus on anything but what her daughter’s last hours were, how afraid she must have been, and who could have done this to a woman everyone loved? But as her anger surfaces and takes hold, Jacque finds a core of strength, a determination to find out who took her beautiful girl from her, and from her now motherless granddaughter.
As the book progresses, the “crime drama” recedes and in intersecting chapters Dove gives readers glimpses into her and her father’s relationship, both past and as revealed. There is poignancy to Dove’s writing in these chapters, and it is here I found a strong and revealing voice, one that I would love to see Dove use again in another book. Though the writing is crisp and strong throughout the novel, in the chapters where Dove writes about her family, and herself, there is a strength and confidence to the language that I responded to.
Quite interesting is Harold Whitlock’s “character,” and I would read a book just based on this paradoxical man and his family. His tragedy is revealed in the pages of Dove’s book, and as one reads, one can see Whitlock begin to fade away as the days, then months, then years go by without a resolution to his wife’s murder, and the continuing suspicion surrounding him. It is as if the very life is sucked from Harold Whitlock, leaving behind but a shadow of the man Dove knew as her father—bigger than life, a man of many gifts.
Do not look for the clichéd television crime shows where the “Murder of the Week” is revealed in fast sensational clips, where cops find perpetrators quickly and accurately, where the line between “bad guys” and “good guys” is easily found. Instead, there are gentle moments, there are poignant moments, there are moments when Dove’s perplexed naivety are revealed and comparably where she is more Adult than the adults, where a young Dove must face a scrutiny most girls her age do not have to face, where a difficult and complex man begins to disappear into the very air he used to suck from the room just by the power of his presence. There is Jacque, who must choose the path she will take: Disappear, too, or Fight. Jacque fights. Indeed, it seems everyone goes on to fight their fight, live their lives, find their peace or place in the world; except for Harold Whitlock.
One wonders if these dark corners in Dove’s life are what led her to write humor? Or, is it the legacy her father gave her in the early days, with his sense of humor, wit, and intelligence?
Meanwhile, Jacque is not done. She is still working to keep Debi’s voice alive with “The Victim’s Voice,” and as well still working on “Debi’s Law.” One imagines she will continue this until her last breath—this is what she has of her daughter, this is what she carries with her in the place of the baby she once held, the girl she raised, the woman she loved and lost much too soon.
And as for Angela Dove? She has written “No Room For Doubt” and in those nooks and crannies and dark corners, she has faced what no daughter wants to face and in the process, Angela Dove must recover from losses of her own.
Angela Dove is an award-winning writer who enjoys crafting stories about the ups and downs of living as they present themselves in small humorous moments. Visit Angela Dove at http://www.angeladove.com/
Kathyrn Magendie is co-managing editor at The Rose & Thorn, and author of Tender Graces.
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