Review: "Of course I remember. Love you; hate you; I never forget you, Mercedes."
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 11, 2014
Welsh by birth author Wendy Evans was an Air Force brat, living throughout the UK.  She first studied English language and literature, geography, art and comparative religion before attending the University of Wales, changing her studies to those of geography, geology, economics, and biology. After marriage she relocated to Australia, working as a mine geologist and geological cartographic artist. Art had always been an important part of her life (hence the emphasis in this book A STUDY IN FLESH) and in addition to her mine work she ran art and drama classes, community organizations, wrote and staged revues and plays. She also wrote for the West Australian and its North West paper as well as free-lancing for four other daily, Sunday and regional papers - and it was this experience that instigated her penchant for writing novels: at the time of her death in 2008 her desk contained twenty unpublished novels. That unfortunate finding as been corrected by her daughters who are in the process of placing their mother's work before the reading public.Wendy Evans works (if this novel is an indicator) demonstrate not only a gift for creating a fascinating story, perhaps a bit overweight in facts and incidents, but written in this case with a keen eye on the visual aspects of her chief character Ron Norman Turner's occupation - a famous Australian painter whose subject matter is celebrity portraiture. In relating this series of adventures in fame, love and tragedy Evans divides her book into sections - each section names for an art technique or term or category: Opus Noir, Imprimatura, Baroque/Rococo, Chiaroscuro, and Impasto, opening each section with a description of a particular color (`Red ochre; this anhydrous iron oxide is a natural earth used since prehistoric times. Significant deposits are found at Minas Gerais, in Brazil, and on Cyprus, in the Aegean Sea. However, in Australia, the site known to Aboriginal artists and traded across the continent, is at Wilgie Mia, in Western Australia. This brilliant red-brown pigment is used extensively in indigenous painting. It has retained its popularity on the palette of the modern artist, offering a safe, permanent color which dries rapidly and has excellent covering power'.) She obviously knows her painting skills and molds the subsequent parts of her book accordingly. In brief, `Ronald' first love Mercedes leaves him to have an abortion, but instead marries a corrupt Indonesian general and fosters their daughter, Liana, with fundamentalists while she pursues a television career. Ron marries art agent Zoe, who defrauds ARTAID, destroying his reputation, as the Establishment conspires against his royal romance. Forced from London, he fights pedophiles in Indonesia, angering the perpetrators. Intrigue, terror and inspiration lead to the Bali bombings. Ron is injured, Liana disfigured. Mercedes, reunited with Ron, makes medical history. At Ron's celebrity-packed funeral, Liana defies terrorist orders and embraces love.' That summary is as succinct as anyone could write and capture all the aspects of the events of this book. But the real taste of Evans' talent is in the painterly, near Larrikinism (the state of being noisy, rowdy, or disorderly) style in which she takes the reader's visual imagination to new heights. Not having read her other novels, one can only marvel at the unique style of writing, wishing that Evans could have enjoyed the public response she is likely to enjoy in absentia. Grady Harp, May 14