Deadly Objectives Book

Susan Kenney, a professor at Colby College in Maine, set this mystery in the familiar setting of a small liberal arts college English department in Maine. For a murder mystery, the role of police and authorities are oddly minimized; the drama is set largely within the faculty of the college. The protagonist is young visiting English professor Roz, and much of the novel is a setting piece, describing her lectures, and her experiences with the not-so-feminist culture of the 1980s ivory tower. This novel was written in 1985, and my rating is based on an '80s rather than a current standard. In fact, its primary value is as an example of its time for those too young to have experienced life in a workplace run largely by men with attitudes formed before the civil rights era. All women at the time had to decide how to relate to the feminist movement, and made many different choices, several of which are shown here. Today, hardboiled tough-as-nails female detectives are standard fare, so some of Roz's uncertainty and reluctance to act can irritate. However, I think that to be honest, the pressures on Roz -- to be nice, to mind her own business, especially since she's at the bottom of the hierarchy, and to be forgiving toward questionable behavior by attractive and powerful men -- all still exist for women today.