Secrets.  Sometimes there's a really good reason for keeping them.  Other times, there is much to be gained by letting them out.  It all depends on the type of secret, and the ratio of the benefit to harm that will come from its reveal.  Belva Plain's Secrecy examines this theme, by allowing several main characters to harbor secrets, and to have to decide which ones to keep, and which ones to set free.

Our main character is Charlotte, whom we first meet as an innocent fourteen year old girl.  But her innocence is shattered, and her life forever altered, by a single cruel act.  This act has ramifications that reach across Charlotte's entire family, and it starts a pattern of secrecy - a pattern that will multiply, and that will follow Charlotte and her family throughout the rest of their lives.

That's the plot, in a nutshell.  The book basically follows Charlotte's life, and the lives of her family-members over many years.  And along the way, the secrets that the various people hold have a way of driving their very lives.  Either they are working hard at keeping the secrets, or they're divulging them, and dealing with the consequences. 

As a reader, I was torn.  I found myself hopeful that the secrets would all come out, because that's where the book's drama comes in.  But I was also sympathetic with the reasons for keeping some of them.  Note that I said "some" of them.  Of course, there are times when keeping a secret protects a loved one, and it makes sense to do so, for that reason.  But there are other secrets that should never be kept.  Secrets that cause far more harm than good.  There were some secrets in this book that I never would have kept, personally.  Some that I said to myself "boy, keeping that secret is only going to cause more trouble down the line".   And sure enough, the characters take years to learn what I could have told them at the beginning: Sometimes speaking up is the right thing to do. 

So, did I enjoy this book?  Well, yes and no.  It was a fast-reader, and I was definitely interested to know how it would all work out in the end.  And Charlotte is a very likeable protagonist, one for whom we only want the best.  But I found myself annoyed with some of the other characters, and the fact that they held onto some of those secrets that should have been divulged early on.  One secret, in particular, made no sense to me whatsoever.  But the book is called Secrecy, and Ms. Plain obviously felt that such a book should contain many, many secrets, even ones that really make no common sense, that no ordinary person would keep.

Furthermore, there's a tiny little subplot regarding one character's past.  But this part of the story was glossed over so quickly that if you blinked you would have missed it, adding nothing to the story.  It really should have been either edited out, or more fully developed.

The writing style is light and breezy - it's an easy book to read, one that doesn't require any heavy-duty thinking.  And I appreciated the lack of graphic violence or sex.  Even the initial cruel act, the one that set the rest of the story in motion, is handled delicately, leaving more to the imagination, rather than relying on uncomfortable details.  But the fact that some of the secondary characters were annoying, and acted illogically, brings the story down a notch. 

Give it a try if you come across it, but don't go out of your way to buy it.


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