Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - June 27, 2004, Winnipeg, Manitoba Sunday june 27, 2004 b8 editor Morley Walker / 697-7307 email books smart demanding thriller Renews genre the Rule of four by Ian Caldwell & Dustin Thomas random House 368 pages $34 reviewed by Lindor Reynolds t he Rule of four a dust jacket wants to make one thing perfectly Clear. Its Young authors started writing their novel in 1998. That a right before Dan Brown wrote his Chart Topping multimillion Selling novel the a Vinci code. No really. They mean it. Caldwell and Thomas May have started writing the Rule of four before Brown published his intricate suspense novel but they owe every thing to its Success. The a Vinci code created an appetite for smart demand ing thrillers a genre that had languished for years. Random House which also published Browns Book clearly recognizes a winning trend. Which is not to say the Rule of four does to stand on its own. Its the smarter of the two books a labyrinth of puzzles clues and brain teasers. Two room mates at Princeton University share an interest in a mysterious 15th-Century manuscript the Hypner Tomachia pol Phili. The text which actually exists is filled with embedded clues to a buried treasure that has captured the imagination of men for generations. Tom Sullivan is the son of a scholar who devoted his life to an obsessive Pursuit of the books secrets. His sin Gle minded dedication ruined his marriage and ultimately his career. While Tom and his father shared their goal of solving the puzzles in the Book the younger Man Heads to Princeton deter mined to let the past stay buried. When he meets Paul Harris As devoted to the Hypner Tomachia a mysteries As was his father Sullivan finds himself drawn Back into the secret world. To solve it they have to master everything from Renaissance Art literature riddles and mathematical formulas. As the Young men Dedi Cate More and More hours to their quest relationships with their other two roommates suffer and Sullivan stands to lose the woman he loves. Harris is writing his thesis on the manuscript a project that May ultimately unearth the Puzzle that has haunted other academics. Before he a done before his agile mind can unlock the secrets hell have to face physical dangers and the fear that someone else is trying to steal his work and his solutions. As Harris a thesis deadline approaches a secret diary that might provide the ultimate solution emerges. Almost immediately another researcher is murdered and the two University seniors have to Battle to prove they weren to involved As they attempt to avoid being next in line for physical harm. The stakes Are raised and As the two friends sift through the codes and clues that make up the text they understand that the manuscript will reveal much More than the actual Loca Tion of a treasure. The Rule of four is More than a novel of suspense. Caldwell and Thomas brilliantly sketch life at Princeton filling it with details of exclusive eating clubs pranks the pressure of deadlines and the jealousy that can follow Success. The Romance Between Sullivan and his Girlfriend Katie at Odds with his obsession with the manuscript is a neat and compe tent examination of a new love affair at an age of tremendous change. While the Rule of four May owe its huge first run to the popularity of the a Vinci code it is ultimately the bet Ter Book. Written with a sequel in mind it deserves the same Chart top Ping Success. Lindor Reynolds is a free press columnist. understanding stepmothers women share their struggles successes and insights by Elizabeth Church Harper Collins 316 pages $33 reviewed by Melissa Steele i n understanding stepmothers Canadian psychologist and psychotherapist Eliza Beth Church sets out to answer the ques Tion Why is it so hard to be a Stepmother the negative framing of the ques Tion predictably leads to a grim Wallow through the anecdotal Hor ror of the often thankless role step mothers play in the Post nuclear family. Church a Stepmother herself who teaches at mount St. Vincent in Halifax is astute at looking at How Ste families go wrong and How stepmothers Are made scape goats. She offers five models for Ste families that should help stepmothers understand that there Are Many possible ways of living in a blended family and of understanding their own responsibility and role within that family. For this Book Church interviewed More than 100 stepmothers. Not All of them were miserable marginalized raging or simply beaten Down but few could recommend the Job. There Are sunny spots in the Book even some stepmothers who like and Are liked by their stepchildren. But Church Points out that most stepmothers go into the role with unattainable expectations. New stepmothers Don to anticipate that they will be resented ignored and overtly disliked by children with whom they have no Long term Bond and Over which they have no authority. They Don to anticipate the feeling of being an outsider in their own Home and they Don to anticipate their own feelings of resentment and staggering guilt towards rude sullen and silent stepchildren. Church argues that the term Stepmother is part of this initial problem. The term Stepmother implies that the fathers wife is a Mother substitute by definition not As Good As the real Mother. Church suggests that the stepmothers who Are the most contented in their role do not see themselves As Mother replacements but rather As part of an extended family network. They function Best As aunts or cousins or friends or big Sisters to their Ste kids. The Luckiest when they become step grandmothers get their own pet names which give them a distinct but valued place in the family. Still the weight of negativity in understanding stepmothers will Likely scare off rather than guide most women who Are just embarking on the role. Chapter headings like the Triumph of experience Over Hope make signing up for armed combat sound like a less onerous life Choice than marrying a Man with children from a previous marriage. One weakness of the Book is that while it pro Vides ample voice to stepmothers and a thorough look at the Structure of Ste families there is no room for comparison with other More conventional families. A similar study of Why is it so hard to be a Mother or a nurse or a brother or Foster child would Likely provide similarly glum accounts. Church assumes that love is rare Between step relatives but guaranteed Between blood relatives. But biological mothers do not always love their children easily effortlessly or Well. Biological mothers too May feel excluded or lacking authority Over their sometimes surly ungrateful and unhappy children. Church is right to Point out that the Stepmother role rarely is successful As a substitute Mother role but she is wrong to imply that All of the negativity the women in her study express is due to their status As stepmothers. Melissa Steele is a Winnipeg writer teacher Mother and Stepmother ;