Ana’s Arrow
by Riley Evans
Published by Storywright Books
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Reviewed by Steven King, MBA
“Love carries a terrible innocence, a seed of destruction, a willing scorn of consequences.”
Ana’s Arrow, a crime novel by Riley Evans, paints a picture of a passion-related crime. Tom Spaulding, the main character, is a nondescript attorney who is in love with Ana Frye, a humble employee at a design-consulting firm. Their picturesque love affair carries quite more than a scorn of consequences.
Many subplots do not receive adequate treatment – in some action inconvenient characters are simply killed off. A priest ends up getting shot by an arrow (which might be Ana’s) as he is out exercising. Conveniently, Tom Spaulding eventually is arrested for the crime. A District Attorney with shoplifting in her past berates him – a fact that Tom uses to buy himself some respite and not the tortuous treatment to which he has been subjected.
Wide turns are made in the action that are puzzling. Numerous references are made to The Circle – to elevate the cloak-n-dagger nature of the mystery. This collection of sinister characters has dramatic, quasi science fiction power, but is never fully developed or even disclosed. The author seems to enjoy the evocative nature of maidens dancing naked in the hallway to amplify the eros of the Circle’s mystique. Cloaked in this slim veneer of mythology, Ana is revealed as the Goddess Diana. One of her best friends happens to be Helen Hickman, recast from Helen of Troy fame, since she abandoned her first husband to marry Peter Hickman.
A battle between Ana and Helen that would make ardent readers of the Dr. Strange comics quite proud, comes and goes with equal ridiculousness. Ana is held sexually captive to the police officer that arrests her husband. The plot is full of sound and fury–but unfortunately, ends nowhere.
The novel’s redeeming nature is the development of the court scenes. Readers interested in good writing depicting modern courts will be pleased. The book’s novelty is that you can enter a plea of guilty/not guilty on the Internet. I voted “not guilty,” since I couldn’t bear to subject the character to anything else so bizarre.
Armchair Interviews says: Heed this reviewer’s comments.