"The Other Side Of Midnight"

I thought I have read crime stories that could last me a lifetime through the maestro, James Hardly Chase and other famous crime story writers until I laid my hand on "the other side of midnight" by Sydney Sheldon. His ability to come up with three different stories and characters and linked them up with a resolution or rather catastrophe that was as treacherous as the whole story itself. I found it hard to swallow the same way the characters were taken to a rollercoaster surprise ride. Sydney Sheldon's unpredictablity was awesome as literature itself.

The story was about three different characters and among them rose a villain or two. First, Larry Douglas who was an American sexiest charming pilot and a womanizer. Then Neolle Page, a beautiful and attractive village girl in Paris whose father referred her as queen and wanted her to be a precious diamond when she grew up. And Catherine Alexander; a young girl from a poor family whose father died with his unsuccessful ambitions of becoming great and she quit school to also chase her unknown and undefined dreams outside academia.

Let's begin with Larry, shall we? He had been a military pilot, flew birds largely in two different countries: England and USA and won medals for his outstanding performance. He's a charmer and women fall in love with him at first sight. He'd been taken them for a sucker punch. His biggest ambition was to fly planes all his life. After the second World War, he left the American Air Force and settle for private companies which didn't work out well for him. Women were his greatest weakness.

Neolle left her home when her father wanted to exchange her for money and used her beauty to charm many important men in France. She met Larry Douglas and spent some couple of weeks together through which he promised to marry her after his return from England. He never returned and left her behind with unwanted early pregnancy which she subsequently got rid off. One thing about Neolle was that she possessed the sensual qualities of pleasing men more than any woman on earth. Through this, she was a movie star and became the mistress of the richest man in the world. She lived to avenge what Larry had done to her through her entire life.

Catherine Alexander quit school after her unsuccessful father died with his dreams. With her intellect and beauty, her boss, Bill Fresser fell in love wit her. Life was too cheap and easily for her until she met Larry Douglas and was hooked by his undeniable charm and she fell in love with him. Even though her boss, through whom she met Larry beamed her a warning about him, she sacrificed everything he'd gotten to marry him. And later when his job was not flourishing, she moved with him to Athens for another job.

Neolle Page was keeping tap on Larry through a detective for more than six years and got him a job with her husband in a mysterious way which both him and her husband didn't know. To her biggest disappointment and upmost surprise, Larry didn't remember her. So she cunningly used her sensual charm and revived her dead relationship to a level of no-return, then asked him to murder his wife and she would get divorce so that they could get married. In his efforts to please the only woman he cannot say "no" to, Larry planned to execute the plan but mysteriously his wife, Catherine drawn herself.

Both Larry and Neolle were charged of murder. Constantin Demiris, Neolle's husband and the richest man on earth knew about their relationship and had been planning to nail them as forgiveness was never a word he adored. His lawyer, Chotas, was undisputed and never lose a case. Through his mastery of crime, seeing how the prosecutor was closing in on them, he asked Larry and Neolle to plead guilty in the court and he would get them not more than six months sentence. Trusting Chotas was like trusting god; they plead guilty in the public on a crime they had not committed, not knowing that there was no deal on the table. Both were executed.

Revived by Aliyu Ibrahim

aliyuibrahim004@gmail.com