The Missing World

A Novel

by Margot Livesey

Knopf, 326 pp., $23

Although critics have compared Margot Livesey (Criminals) to the mystery novelist P. D. James, Livesey’s latest novel, The Missing World, does not focus on murder, but instead builds its fascinating and suspenseful web around the ordinary (and sometimes extraordinary) events of daily life. Hazel has suffered a head injury that has left her with a case of amnesia; the past three years of her life have vanished from her memory. Her ex-boyfriend, Jonathan, happily takes her back in while she recuperates, quite eager to win back her affection now that she can’t remember his past transgressions. Livesey also introduces a few other seemingly unrelated characters into this London backdrop, among them Charlotte, an out-of-work actress, and Freddie, an African-American hiding in England from personal demons back in the States. All of them are haunted by events from the past, or in Hazel’s case, the lack of a recent past. From the moment Livesey sets these characters in motion, the novel becomes an engrossing page-turner as the reader waits to see how all of their lives will collide, which they do in surprising and moving ways. Livesey’s writing is crisp and precise, the characters finely etched (particularly creepy Jonathan), and the plot expertly constructed.

This article appears in March 17 • 2000.

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