Showing posts with label Tana French. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tana French. Show all posts

Wednesday 8 February 2023

My Year in Books 2023: January

I'm posting this a little late, but it's time for the first of this year's blog posts with mini-reviews of the books I read for pleasure (so, not including the ones I read for review or research this month). I read six novels in January, almost all of which were library books. That became a bit of a trend in 2022, so let's see how long that carries on this year!

Here are the books I read in January...

White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi (2009)


Things got a bit jumbled at the beginning of the year. I started a book in December that I’d intended to finish in January, but then someone recalled a library book I’d borrowed so I had to set the first book to one side so I could return White is for Witching on time! Oyeyemi’s novel is a slim but incredibly rich book that’s part ghost story, part coming-of-age tale, and part allegory (with political themes that are explicit in places, and unsettlingly implicit in others). Miranda Silver is a teenager who suffers from pica – an eating disorder that causes suffers to crave things that aren’t food (in Miranda’s case, it’s chalk). Miranda lives in a house (the ‘Silver House’) in Dover that’s open as a Bed and Breakfast, with her father and twin brother, Eliot. Miranda and Eliot’s mother died when they were sixteen, causing Miranda to have a breakdown and spend several months in a clinic. When she returns, she becomes inextricably linked to the Silver House, which – as we find out from the novel’s prologue, is sentient and, as we find out from subsequent events, vilely xenophobic. The novel has two parts – one set before Miranda goes away to university, and one that takes place after she gets a place at Cambridge – and the storytelling style switches perspectives and styles to create a fragmented, but captivating, narrative. It’s not the most subtle book you’ll read, but I read this in a single sitting and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Black Lake Manor by Guy Morpuss (2022)


After I finished White is for Witching, I went back and finished the book I started in December. And I’m very glad I did! I got Black Lake Manor in one of my Abominable Book Club parcels late last year. It promised to be a ‘time-bending murder mystery’ like ‘Agatha Christie on steroids’. I think I prefer the first description to the second. The book’s protagonist is Ella Manning, a part-time constable with the RCMP who has to solve the murder of her childhood friend, billionaire Lincoln Shan, who has been killed in a locked room after a storm has cut off his mansion. Wait – rewind. This isn’t quite how the book pans out (although it sort of is). We don’t actually meet Ella Manning until a few chapters in. The first thing we read is a description of a shipwreck in 1804, off Vancouver Island. The next thing we read is a description of a party in 2025, at which a young Lincoln Shan exercises a peculiar power, the power to turn back time by several hours. And then we meet Ella! The murder mystery element of the novel is set in 2045, when Lincoln has grown rich as a result of his actions two decades earlier. He throws a party to show off a new innovation his company has created, but is found murdered in very strange circumstances that night. I can’t say much more without giving things away, so I’ll just say this is a strong recommendation!

Eight Detectives by Alex Pavesi (2020)


Eight Detectives
has an intriguing premise… Thirty years ago, Grant McAllister, a maths professor, wrote a collection of short stories to illustrate his thesis that there is a mathematical formula behind all mystery stories. Now living a reclusive life in the Mediterranean, he is tracked down by editor Julia Hart, whose publishing company is looking to release a new edition of McAllister’s stories. The book also has an intriguing format… the chapters alternate between scenes in which Grant and Julia discuss the stories and the stories themselves, so there’s seven detective stories (mostly in the Golden Age vein) and an eighth narrative that frames them. Before I started, I was expecting something like Italo Calvino’s If on a winter’s night a traveller… crossed with Diane Setterfield’s The Thirteenth Tale. Perhaps it’s because I really like those two books, but I felt that Eight Detectives didn’t quite live up to its promise. The seven stories are definitely fun to read, and I enjoyed Grant’s elucidation of his ‘formula’ (it isn’t anything a mystery fan wouldn’t know, but it was fun to see it described in mathematical terms, and it does make you think about things a little differently). The disappointing bit, for me, was the framing narrative. Don’t get me wrong, the way the details are drip-fed is well done, but it was a little bit predictable in the end. Still, Pavesi’s writing style is very engaging and Eight Detectives is a fun read, so I think it’s still a recommendation.

Kingdomtide by Rye Curtis (2019)


I’ve built up quite the pile of library books, so I’m trying to make a dent in it this month. The next book I read was a book I borrowed ages ago, and I’m not sure I should keep renewing it! Like the last book I read, Kingdomtide also has an intriguing premise (not a coincidence, of course, as I’m generally drawn to books that are a bit off-beat or unexpected). The book begins with an older couple, Cloris Waldrip and her husband, taking a small plane over the Montana mountains. The plane crashes, killing Mr Waldrip and the pilot, and seventy-two-year-old Cloris is left stranded in the wilderness. The story then alternates between chapters (told from Cloris’s first-person perspective) about the older woman’s survival, which includes help from an unlikely source, and third-person chapters about Debra Lewis, an alcoholic park ranger who becomes fixated on finding Mrs Waldrip. Kingdomtide is incredibly readable and compelling – if a little strange and grim in places (I genuinely squirmed at the bits describing Lewis’s interactions with a search-and-rescue officer). Cloris’s narration is almost mesmerizing, and I really enjoyed the way we slowly learn about her pre-crash life, as well as her ‘present day’ tribulations in the wilderness. Lewis is somewhat less well-rounded, perhaps because we never get her narration of events, and so we never get to know her quite as intimately as we know Cloris, but she’s still a pretty memorable character. I was absolutely gripped from the start with this one.

The Searcher by Tana French (2021)


And it’s another library book now! I’m a huge fan of Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels, a series that ran for six novels. Her two most recent books (The Wych Elm and The Searcher) are standalone novels that are, in many ways, quite different to the Dublin Murder Squad novels, in terms of both plot and style. They’re also quite different to one another, which seems to suggest that French is moving away from being a ‘series author’ and becoming a bit more eclectic in her output. That said, The Searcher is still a mystery novel, and it does bear some comparison with her earlier work. The main character is Cal Hooper, an American ex-police officer who has moved to a remote Irish village to enjoy some rural seclusion in his retirement. As he’s working on renovating the old house he’s bought, he’s approached by a kid called Trey, whose brother has gone missing. Word has got round that Cal used to be a detective, and so he is reluctantly drawn into the mystery of Trey’s brother’s disappearance. The story unfolds at a slow pace, and the mystery here is quite as intricate as some the Dublin novels (particularly In the Woods and The Likeness), but – as in French’s other work – there’s a real focus on character and relationships. In many ways, the real draw of this book is the developing relationship between Cal and Trey, and how this fits with the claustrophobic village in which they both live.

Home by Amanda Berriman (2018)


And another library book (though this one’s from a different library for a bit of variety)! Home has something of an unusual first-person narrator, in that Jesika is four years old.. I have to admit, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to get through a whole book told by a four-year-old, and the first page had me doubting whether I could handle the style and vocabulary of Jesika’s narration. It’s amazing how quickly those doubts went away. I was sucked into Jesika’s story by about page 3! As you might imagine, Berriman tells the story by showing us how Jesika interprets events, relying on the adult reader to understand what is actually happening. And it’s not the most cheerful set of circumstances that we discern. Jesika lives in a rented flat with her mum and her baby brother. The landlord isn’t a very nice person, and the flat is in disrepair. Jesika’s mum and brother fall ill from breathing in mould, and the family is facing eviction. Jesika also makes a new friend, Paige, who is hiding an awful secret. It’s testament to Berriman’s writing that this isn’t trivialized or obscured by Jesika’s own concerns, like what games will be played at preschool and which of the local shopkeepers are her friend. Nevertheless, Jesika is the hero of the story, and the climactic events – in which she steps up to be a hero (within the limits of being four years old) – are incredibly moving and powerful.

Sunday 2 February 2020

My Year in Books 2020: January

I've decided to carry on with my monthly book review posts (can you believe this is the third year now!). I'm finding it a good way of keeping track of the books I read for pleasure - much more useful than using an external site - so you're kind of stuck with these posts for now!

First post of the year, so it's my short reviews for January! Here's what I read...

Lethal White by Robert Galbraith (2018)


I’ve been looking forward to this one for a while, as I really like Robert Galbraith’s fiction. (Weirdly, I don’t like any J.K. Rowling books – a fact that baffles me.) Lethal White is the fourth book about private detective Cormoran Strike, and his secretary – then assistant – now partner – Robin Ellacott. The story opens with a prologue that follows on directly from Career of Evil, but then it jumps ahead to the following year. After the events of the earlier book, Strike’s detective agency has been thrust into the public eye (well, even more so, as the events of The Cuckoo’s Calling also brought it some notoriety). As well as juggling multiple cases, Strike is offered two intriguing puzzles to solve. Firstly, an apparently mentally ill man called Billy arrives at his office claiming to have witnessed a murder when he was a child. Secondly, an MP asks for Strike’s help, as he’s being blackmailed. Of course, it’s not long before there’s a hint that the two cases might be connected somehow. I will admit, I was dubious about the length of the book before I read it. The paperback is a bit of a doorstop, and way longer than is usual for the genre. However, as with the other Strike novels, it’s incredibly readable, and so it really didn’t feel overlong. Yes, perhaps, some of the sections about Strike and Robin’s relationships could have been cut down slightly, but there’s an excellent mystery (with well-placed clues) at the book’s heart.

Local Girl Missing by Claire Douglas (2016)


This next one is a book I picked up in a charity shop in Aberystwyth when we stayed there last November. I thought I’d read another book by the author, but I realized afterwards that I’d got confused about that. Still, the blurb was intriguing enough, even though I had a suspicion it might be a domestic noir-type thriller (and I’ve still got a strange relationship with that genre). Local Girl Missing is the story of Francesca (and it’s partly told from her perspective), who grew up in a small seaside town in the South-West. Twenty years ago, Francesca’s best friend Sophie fell off the old pier, in an incident that has haunted her ever since. Now Sophie’s brother has called Francesca to drop the bombshell that Sophie’s remains have finally been found, and he wants her to return to Oldcliffe to help him find out what happened. Francesca’s narration is interspersed with entries from Sophie’s diary in the run-up to her disappearance. As she and Daniel speak to Sophie’s old friends, Francesca feels increasingly (and almost tangibly) haunted by the past – is there something else going on here? I’ve got to admit, I did twig what was going on a bit before the end, but I still enjoyed Local Girl Missing. It’s a quick read, but it’s well-paced and Douglas builds the suspense effectively, plus I found some of the flashbacks to Francesca and Sophie’s relationship both nostalgic (as I’m roughly the same age as the characters) and convincing.

The Wych Elm by Tana French (2018)


I was looking forward to this next one, but ultimately it was a teeny bit of a disappointment. Don’t get me wrong, The Wych Elm is excellently written and has a compelling story. It’s just that I’m such a huge fan of Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels that this one had a lot to live up to. The Wych Elm is a standalone –a mystery thriller rather than a detective novel. The central character is Toby, a privileged (and rather charming) man in his late twenties, looking forward to a happy future with his girlfriend Melissa. One night, everything changes, as Toby suffers a life-altering and traumatic assault. In recovery, he returns to his old family home (now his uncle’s), as his uncle has developed terminal cancer. Toby needs to heal, but he also needs to take care of his relative. However, a chance discovery in the garden upends Toby’s life even further – a skull is found in the eponymous wych elm tree. Perhaps Toby’s happy conception of his life – and his family – aren’t strictly accurate. As I say, the story is pretty compelling, but I found it didn’t grip me quite as much as the Dublin Murder Squad novels. Some of the revelations are a little far-fetched, though I did like the way in which Toby’s patchy memories become tangled and uncertain. The idea that a family history might be misremembered or experienced differently was definitely interesting, but there was something a little flat about this particular family.

The Guesthouse by Abbie Frost (2019)


I picked this one up (as usual) on a whim at the supermarket. The blurb looked like it might be a bit like And Then There Were None – seven guests check into a guesthouse, but it looks like they might not all survive. And… I was right. The Guesthouse begins like a millennial version of And Then There Were None. The central character, Hannah, is a twenty-five-year-old woman who is dealing with some stuff. She checks herself into the eponymous guesthouse for a week’s holiday to take her mind off things, and also to reconnect with her past. The guesthouse is in a remote location in Ireland, and the access is not as easy as the website promised. And there’s a storm coming too… I’m in two minds about this one. I loved the way Frost updated the central conceit of And Then There Were None for the twenty-first century, and the way the guests were brought to (and kept) in the guesthouse was definitely pretty cool. I also found Hannah – in the first half of the book – an engaging and relatable character. However, the plot isn’t quite as classy as Christie’s (and I shouldn’t keep comparing the two books, but it’s impossible not to). Rather than ramping up suspense and suspicion, The Guesthouse instead ramps up the backstory to the point of (almost) implausibility. I became less invested as the story went on, and the eventual reveal(s) really stretched my credulity. It’s a shame, because the book starts well.

The Family by Louise Jensen (2019)


I bought The Family in a charity shop in Truro at Christmas. I didn’t realize until part way through that I’d chosen to read a book with almost the exact same image on the cover as The Guesthouse – that was a complete coincidence. And, cover art aside, The Family is a bit different to The Guesthouse. Laura and her daughter Tilly are left grieving and in debt following the death of Gavan, Laura’s husband. A chance kindness from a woman called Saffron (someone Laura vaguely knows through her work) leads the women to a farm in Mid Wales that’s being run as a community/commune by a mysterious young man called Alex. As the book hints from its very first page, bad things are going to happen on the farm. And they do. I’ve got to admit, I didn’t really enjoy this one. I struggled to sympathize with the characters, mostly because they weren’t plausible for the ages they were meant to be – Laura doesn’t feel like a 34-year-old, and Alex isn’t believable as a 28-year-old. I also found I was drawn out of the story a lot by little anachronisms and inaccuracies, and by a timeframe that doesn’t quite make sense. No spoilers, but the ending was probably the best part of the plot, as it moved the story back into the realms of the believable. However, it was hard to get too enthused, as I really hadn’t engaged with the characters. Overall, this one probably needed much tighter editing.

She Lies in Wait by Gytha Lodge (2019)


The next book I read this month was one I picked up at the supermarket because the blurb looked intriguing (I probably have to stop doing that!). She Lies in Wait is a cold-case detective novel. Teenager Aurora Jackson disappeared thirty years ago, after going camping with her older sister and her friends. When a body is discovered in the woods, it quickly becomes apparent that Aurora has finally been found. A murder investigation is launched by DCI Jonah Sheens, and Aurora’s sister Topaz and her friends are the prime suspects. She Lies in Wait is a fairly standard cold-case story, with a bit of Secret History-esque conflict between the rather privileged bunch of suspects (in fact, one of the characters actually draws attention to the similarity in an explicit reference to Donna Tartt’s novel). It’s a very readable story, and there are some interesting interactions between the police team, but I found the actual mystery at the heart of the book to be a little disappointing. The problem is that there are clues implicating all of the suspects, and nothing that points to any particular one of them. By the time the reveal came, I felt like it could have been any of them, and I felt a bit cheated as a reader, as I could only guess the answer, not solve it. Nevertheless, Lodge is a good writer, and I did enjoy the way the story unfolded. Not the best mystery, but definitely not the worst one either!

Friday 23 November 2018

My Year in Books 2018: October

Okay, it's another delayed post from me. But better late than never, I guess. Another month of sticking to my New Year's resolution. I found time to read four novels for pleasure in October (though I don't appear to have been very varied in my genre choice - it's all crime fiction this month!), so here are my short reviews of the titles I read.

(You can read all the other posts from this year here: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September)

I'll Keep You Safe by Peter May (2018)


I’m a big fan of Peter May’s novels. I loved the Lewis trilogy and reread the Enzo MacLeod books a couple of times. My mum and my mother-in-law are both fans as well, and it just so happened that both of them got a copy of I’ll Keep You Safe at the same time – and then they both offered to lend me their copy when they’d finished, so I raced them! My mum won (just), so I read her copy of the book. This is a book that I’d heard May talk about prior to its completion. He described it as ‘From Paris to Harris’ (though it turns out that the Hebridean portion of the book is set in Lewis, not Harris). Ruairidh and Niamh Macfarlane are the owners and creators of the Ranish Tweed fabric brand. During a trip to Paris Fashion Week, Niamh learns that Ruairidh has been having an affair, but then almost immediately witnesses her husband and his lover killed by a car bomb. She returns to Lewis bereft, but – of course – there are further revelations to come. I do enjoy Peter May’s writing, but this wasn’t one of my favourites. I loved the flashback sections describing Ruairidh and Niamh’s relationship, but the ‘present day’ crime chapters were a bit plodding and predictable. It’s a shame, because I think I probably would have been more than happy to have read a book just about the Macfarlanes and Ranish Tweed (though that might have been less marketable!).

The Secret Place by Tana French (2014)


Earlier in the year, I read a few of Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels out of sequence, so managed to miss out the fifth one. This month, I finally read The Secret Place. The book sees the return of Stephen Moran (a minor character in Faithful Place) and teams him up with Antoinette Conway, a prickly and unpopular member of the Murder Squad, for the first time. The book begins with Holly Mackey – daughter of the main detective in Faithful Place – telling Moran about a development in a year-old murder investigation at her school. Moran grudgingly passes the information on to Conway, but on the understanding that he’ll be able to join the investigation. The two visit Holly’s boarding school to reopen the inquiry into the murder of Chris Harper, a pupil at the neighbouring boys’ school. The prime suspects are two cliques of girls – Holly and her friends, and a rival group – and the book switches between the police investigation and flashbacks to Holly’s gang’s involvement with Chris Harper, but also (more significantly) with each other. Like In the Woods, it’s as much about friendship as it is about a murder investigation. It’s not quite as good as In the Woods and Broken Harbour, but I preferred it to The Trespasser. Oh, and ignore any reviews that criticise the so-called ‘unexplained supernatural element’ – there’s a single, beautiful sentence that explains everything towards the end of the book, which reminded me just why I’m a fan of French’s work.

The Sleeping and the Dead by Ann Cleeves (2001)


Clearly, I wasn’t feeling very experimental this month so I seem to have stuck to writers I know. The Sleeping and the Dead is one of Cleeves’s standalone novels, so not part of the Vera or Shetland series. The book begins with the discovery of a long-dead body in a lake. Detective Peter Porteous (who is quite an unusual detective, not because he has a lot of eccentric quirks, but because he’s so calm and self-contained throughout the investigation) quickly narrows down the possibilities for identification, before concluding that the body must be that of Michael Grey, a young man who hasn’t been seen since the 1970s. Michael was an enigmatic man, who arrived in the local area to live with foster parents in his final year at school. No one appears to know where Michael came from or who his family was. The book switches between Porteous’s investigation and the story of Hannah Morton, a prison officer who was once Michael’s girlfriend. Hannah reminisces on her relationship with Michael, but also finds herself drawn into the investigation more directly (and dangerously) than she’d like. I was really drawn into this story and found myself engaged with Hannah’s story (and the mysterious Michael, of course). However, I’m not sure the mystery really went anywhere. It’s definitely a page-turner, but the denouement and explanation was a little bit of an anti-climax. There was also a bit of a tricksy coincidence that had to be swallowed on the journey to the resolution.

Unnatural Causes by P.D. James (1967)


Okay, I know I sort of concluded last time that P.D. James wasn’t for me. But I got a really nasty cold towards the end of the month, and I just wanted some comfort reading (aka a whodunnit). I couldn’t find any Golden Age stuff that I fancied, so I thought I’d give James another whirl. And this one started off well. Adam Dalgliesh (admittedly not my favourite literary detective) is staying with his Aunt Jane (not Jane Marple) in Suffolk when one of the neighbours is found murdered and mutilated. The victim was a crime novelist, and he appears to have been killed with a method taken from his own writing. The other residents of the little village are all suspects, though some big crime types in that London also drift in and out of the frame. I loved the chapters in the village, with the vague air of menace that surrounded even mundane social interactions. However, the plot was at once convoluted and underexplained. I’m still not totally sure why that particular far-fetched method of murder (and the mutilation) was chosen. James isn’t too hot on clues (unlike my beloved Agatha), but I still guessed the culprit here. I also don’t quite get what was going on with Dalgliesh’s personal life. Did he break up with his girlfriend at the end? Or not? And why was he being so randomly aloof? To be fair, I’m probably going to stick with the Dalgliesh novels now – but just for completism.

Wednesday 21 February 2018

My Year in Books 2018: January

This post is part of my New Year's Resolution. I realised at Christmas that I'd started to fall out of a couple of habits. (1) I haven't been finding time to read for pleasure. (2) I'm out of practice at writing short-form reviews (to be frank, I don't seem to be able to do any short-form writing at all at the moment!).

So, I have resolved to read more books just for fun, and to write short (250 words maximum) reviews of each one as I go along. These are just the books I've read because I liked the look of them - so I won't be including any books I read to 'officially' review, for academic research, for a long-form blog post, or for my radio show. The plan is to post the reviews on here each month (though, let's be honest, how long am I actually going to stick to a New Year's Resolution??).

Here are the books I read in January...

Faithful Place by Tana French (2010)


Faithful Place is the third of French’s ‘Dublin Murder Squad’ novels. I loved the first two novels, In the Woods and The Likeness (particularly In the Woods). The novels aren’t a series as such, but rather feature detectives from the same fictional squad. Each book has a narrator who had appeared as a minor character in an earlier novel. So, the narrator-protagonist of Faithful Place is Frank Mackey, who previously appeared in The Likeness. Frank is a murder detective, who is estranged from his dysfunctional family. He’s called back home on the discovery of a twenty-year-old suitcase during construction work on the estate (the ‘Faithful Place’ of the book’s title). The suitcase belonged to Rosie Daly, Frank’s girlfriend. Once upon a time, Frank and Rosie planned to elope to England, but on the night they were due to go, Rosie didn’t show up. For two decades, Frank believed that Rosie had gone to England on her own… but the discovery of her suitcase makes that seem unlikely. Frank is drawn back into his old life to find out the truth about Rosie’s disappearance. I love French’s writing, and Faithful Place is a gripping and compelling story. I didn’t like it quite as much as her two earlier books – perhaps because it doesn’t feel quite as richly layered (the earlier two were almost dazzling in the way past and present narratives intertwined), or perhaps because I found the denouement a bit predictable. Still, it was an enjoyable read and very well-written.

The Trespasser by Tana French (2016)


Because I can be a bit bingey with my reading, the next book I read this month was another of French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels. But I made a mistake and went straight to the sixth and most recent title, instead of carrying on in order. Good thing it’s not a straight series, eh? The Trespasser features Antoinette Conway as the narrator (she’d previously appeared in one of the books I accidentally skipped), a hotheaded detective who’s teamed up with Stephen Moran (a minor character in Faithful Place). Conway and Moran are assigned to a case that looks like a straightforward domestic, but soon discover (obviously) that there’s much more to it. I’ve got to admit, I didn’t enjoy The Trespasser as much as French’s other novels, though it was still undoubtedly well-written. Conway is a bit of a cliché – the short-tempered rookie with a chip on her shoulder, the woman fighting to be taken seriously in a man’s world – and the case itself is a little flat compared to some of the others French has created. As Conway and Moran discover the victim’s hidden depths and secrets, I couldn’t help but think back to The Likeness, which was a much richer and more compelling read. That said, I’m not giving up on French, as she’s still one of the best writers of police procedural thrillers (not always my favourite genre) that I’ve come across. I guess she just set the bar high with In the Woods and The Likeness!

Broken Harbour by Tana French (2012)


Continuing with my Tana French binge: Broken Harbour is the fourth of the Dublin Murder Squad novels. The narrator-protagonist is Michael ‘Scorcher’ Kennedy, who appeared as a minor (rather unsympathetic) character in Faithful Place. This was the best example of French’s narrator series so far. On the one hand, Broken Harbour redeems and clarifies some of the negative characteristics seen in the previous book; on the other, the presentation of Kennedy here is always shadowed by what we saw in Faithful Place. The book is in first-person, so we’re seeing the narrator through his own eyes, and it’s good to have the earlier book as a reminder of how this comes across to others. The case in Broken Harbour is multiple murder: the seemingly happy Spain family have been brutally attacked in their home. It appears that Pat Spain has snapped and killed his children, attempted to kill his wife Jenny, and then committed suicide. But (obviously) there may be more going on here… The Spains lived in a house on a ‘ghost estate’ (a housing development abruptly halted mid-construction as a result of the financial crash). French creates a setting that is paradoxically claustrophobic and desolate, to great effect. Added to this, her detective brings further ghosts to the investigation, not least his memories of the estate’s former existence as Broken Harbour, a holiday village he visited as a child. I really enjoyed Broken Harbour, certainly as much as The Likeness and almost as much as In the Woods.

Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough (2017)


I bought my mum this book for Christmas, as I’d heard good things (and it was shelved in the bookshop next to other writers that she likes). She read it, then passed it to me. She didn’t give anything away but wanted me to read it so we could talk about the ending. Behind her Eyes was marketed on this ending – the publishers claimed it was one you would never see coming, and exhorted readers not to give anything away after they’d discovered the twist. The book is told from alternating perspectives. Mostly, it switches between Adele, the fragile but devoted wife of psychiatrist David, and Louise, a much warmer and engaging character, who works as a secretary at David’s new practice. Almost accidentally, Louise begins a relationship with David and a friendship with Adele, quickly suspecting there’s something lurking beneath the surface of their marriage. In a way, it’s a shame the publicity for the book focused on the shock ending. Ignoring the twist, Behind her Eyes is really well-written and compelling, and Louise in particular is a wonderfully crafted unreliable narrator. The growing tension of the relationships between the three main characters make for a real page-turner. But, sadly, the ending is a let-down. You don’t see the twist coming because it belongs to an entirely different genre to the rest of the novel and feels somewhat incongruous. Turns out my mum wanted me to read it so she could tell me why she didn’t like the ending.

The Child by Fiona Barton (2017)


Barton’s second novel was apparently a Richard and Judy Book Club pick – and I’ve had some disappointing experiences with these in the past – but the plot description seemed right up my street. (And it’s another book with alternating first-person unreliable narrators, which appears to be my jam this month.) When the skeleton of a new-born baby is discovered during building work in London, journalist Kate Waters is intrigued and determines to find an angle on the story. Meanwhile, the discovery of the body causes anxiety for a woman named Emma, and hope for grieving mother Angela, whose daughter went missing several decades earlier. These three women are our main narrators, and we switch between their perspectives on the ‘Building Site Baby’ case. Barton’s novel is nicely readable, and the intertwining of the story’s threads is well done. I admit, I initially had a bit of trouble distinguishing Emma from Angela, but the book finds its voice(s) as the story progresses, and the decision to hold things together with Kate’s investigation was a good one. Of course, there’s more to the story than just the death of the child, and the various revelations were pretty well paced. The Child was an enjoyable and gripping enough read, which I finished in a couple of sittings. It’s a solid thriller, but I wouldn’t say it was a stand-out (and I did work out the ending about halfway through). Overall, I’d say this was a solid ‘cold case thriller’ novel, but not particularly mind-blowing.

Elizabeth is Missing by Emma Healey (2014)


The last book I read this month was Emma Healey’s Elizabeth is Missing, a book which got a lot of praise on its publication, and which has been compared more than once to Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. The novel’s narrator is Maud, an older woman with dementia, who is concerned that her friend Elizabeth has gone missing. As with The Curious Incident, we are given a mystery through the eyes of someone who doesn’t actually know what it is they’re investigating, and we’re encouraged as readers to look beyond what is being described to what must be ‘really’ happening. But Elizabeth is Missing is much more than this. Despite her narration being distorted, fragmented, repetitive and contradictory, Maud is an engaging and sympathetic protagonist. As she interacts with other characters (who, supposedly, understand what’s happening), I found myself empathizing with Maud’s frustration, internally shouting at one character in particular ‘Just answer her question!’. As the story progresses, Maud increasingly sees the behaviour of others as difficult and erratic, and it’s hard not to feel the same as a reader. That said, Maud’s occasional moments of self-awareness are painful and poignant (as is the ending). But my favourite part of the book was the copious notes that Maud left for herself, in order to retain a focus on the mystery of Elizabeth’s disappearance. These made the book feel a bit like an old lady version of Memento, which I very much enjoyed. Highly recommended.