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mindyt's review against another edition
4.0
This was a really good book! I picked it up at a library book sale over 10 years ago and have just now read it! Good mystery and a good amount of suspense. Looking forward to the next in the series!
pturnbull's review
3.0
Free Reign is the first in the Ellis Portal series. It's the story of a former judge who we meet after he becomes homeless and his home becomes a box in a natural area in or near Toronto. The strength of the novel is its setting and plot. The author describes the society of homeless in Toronto, at the same time making the life out of doors sound enviable, beautiful, and free. Details about sights, scents, and sounds draw us in so that we don't think too closely about Portal's fall from grace. The plot is suspenseful, but it wasn't really the mystery surrounding the Second Chance home for girls that kept my attention. Instead, it was the kind of relationships that Portal had with other homeless, as well as with members of the close circle of lawyers he met while in law school, that interested me. This novel is worth reading, but something about it just manages to brush against the four star level without quite attaining it. I think it's Portal's character. I'm probably expecting too much, but Rosemary Aubert, the author, has created an intriguing situation for him, one rich in possibility, but he simply doesn't reveal enough for us to identify with him or be particularly moved by his plight. I think he's not vulnerable enough.
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