Character Flaws: Inspector Lynley’s Class-y Behavior

SPOILER ALERT: Far down in this post I discuss a couple of plot points in Elizabeth George’s latest Inspector Lynley novel, “This Body of Death.” Feel free to skip if you don’t want to know a thing…

I told you I was going to start blogging again…and I’m going to bring back several of my old “features,” including “What’s On Your Nightstand?” One of those old features was “Character Flaws,” in which I reconsider famous or archetypal characters from literature. Since I’m unbelievably lazy and careless about adding tags and categories to my blog post, you may not be able to find all of the former entries. However, since there were only two or three, you’re not missing much.

Ha! Ha! Well, that will change. I’m back and with a renewed sense of bloggy purpose, which brings me to today’s subject: Inspector Thomas Lynley, the blonde, blue-blooded, and bloody complicated chief detective of Elizabeth George’s mystery novels.

I’ve been a huge fan (yes! I said “fan,” not “reader” — sorry, but that describes it best in the case of books in series) of George’s books since the first in the Lynley/Havers/St. James series came out in 1988, “A Great Deliverance.” I was hooked early and hard by the quartet of genteel English people at the series’ center — Thomas Lynley, Simon St. James, Deborah Cotter, and Lady Helen Clyde. I blame the aunt who introduced me to Agatha Christie; from there it was a slippery slope to Margery Allingham, Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Minette Walters, and so many more authors who penned (and pen) mystery novels that use the British class system (to a greater or lesser extent) as one aspect of their work.

Thomas Lynley, AKA Lord Asherton (he’s the 8th Earl thereof), has always struggled with his noble lineage and status. I know that  many of my fellow readers may disagree with me, but I’ve never bought into Lynley’s figurative forelock-tugging about his rank and privilege. He moans about it and tries to get all of his fellow police officers to treat him like one of the chavs when he’s on duty — but he has little compunction all through the series about using his family’s inherited lucre to indulge his propensity for Saville Row togs and very, very, very expensive vintage automobiles.

Also, let’s face it: He couldn’t marry Deborah, the daughter of his valet Joseph Cotter. He went for Lady Helen Clyde, she of the silly shoes and thinly developed personality (notice I did not say “thinly developed character;” I think Elizabeth George is very deliberate, canny, and smart about what she chooses to emphasize in her books).

In “This Body of Death,” the newest Elizabeth George Lynley novel, “Tommy” Lynley has another choice to make between the lower- and upper-class women in his life. This time, it’s not just personal and/or romantic, either; it’s personal and professional. (See? I told you George is deliberate about these things. Even if you don’t care for this novel — and my colleague Maureen Corrigan certainly didn’t — it’s wonderful to see George’s wheels turning as her career progresses). Will Lynley give his loyalty (and his kisses) to new Chief Inspector Isabel Ardery, or remain connected in solidarity and friendship to his former partner Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers?

For me, “This Body of Death” will stand as the series title in which Elizabeth George tears the shrink wrap off of her Ken doll of a character, Lynley, exposing him to light, air, and his own limitations. There’s a particularly poignant scene in which Lynley meets Havers at a motorway Little Chef (sort of the British equivalent of a Denny’s). His distaste at her eager consumption of a fry-up lunch, his obvious discomfort at having his superb auto in the parking lot, and his growing disaffection for his old team make the reader as uneasy as Barbara.

Lynley is a right toff, in other words. How fabulous! Instead of trying to make all of her characters politically correct, Elizabeth George is choosing to make all of her characters complex. I look forward to what happens next. The books, taken individually, may be uneven. The series, taken as a whole, is a triumph.