It's always hard to follow up a good mystery/suspense novel with a new book. I'm never quite sure what I am in the mood for until I have sampled a few other stories, and then there is the issue of whether the book is just 'more of the same' or something a little bit different. To be fair sometimes I do want another reliably good story in the same vein as the book I just finished, but lately when it comes to thrillers, I don't exactly want mainstream. So I have been grazing a little (lots of shuffling about behind the scenes), and while the books I have been trying have been good, it is the Goldilocks syndrome. I think finally I have found a book that is 'just right'. And it has been right under my nose all along!
Every day I straighten the popular reading collection at my library (the one I am so lucky to curate). I try and make selections that will appeal widely, but I admit I often give in to personal temptations, too (as in, I wouldn't mind reading that one myself). So when Flynn Berry's Under the Harrow came in I took mental note, but it went out to the shelves. I'm not sure what made me think of it yesterday, but as I was coming back from lunch I detoured and saw it sitting waiting for me. I started reading at the gym after work and almost from the first page I was/am hooked!
So the premise is, or at least it begins--Nora takes the train from London to go visit her sister in the countryside. At first glance they seem quite close and spend time together even though a distance normally separates the two. Nora is (I think) a writer who has just won a grant to go work in Paris and her sister Rachel works as a nurse practitioner. She lives alone with her dog Fenno. When Nora arrives her sister is not at the train station to meet her. Not unusual as she may have gotten caught up at work, but Nora expects to see her walking to meet her or perhaps at home in the kitchen preparing their evening meal. When she arrives she knows almost from the first something is wrong, and when she enters the house she finds first the dog dead, then bloodied hand prints on the stairs, and then her sister Rachel . . .
Yes, so far, rather chilling. When the police arrive and are questioning her she tells them that some years back her sister was assaulted but the police did not believe her, so now Nora is skeptical that things will be different. And that is as far as I got, but I am already looking forward to finding a quiet corner to keep reading. I have a couple of teasers--the first rather pleasant and the second not graphic but we'll call it atmospheric . . .
On the train Nora is thinking about Cornwall where the two sisters plan on spending the Christmas holidays.
"I loved Cornwall with a mad, jealous ardor. I was twenty-nine and had only just discovered it, but it belonged to me. The list of things I loved about Cornwall was long but not complete."
"It included our house, of course, and the town, the Lizard Peninsula, and the legend of King Arthur, whose seat was a few miles up the coast at Tintagel. The town of Mousehole, pronounced 'mouzall'. Daphne du Maurier and last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again, and of course you did, anyone who left would. The widow's walks. The photographs in pubs of wrecks, and of townspeople in long brown skirts and jackets, dwarfed by the ruined hills."
And then Nora arrived and we know what she found and the situation with her sister.
"Rachel said there was something wrong with the town. I can't remember exactly when this happened. It was recent, sometime after we got back from Cornwall. I didn't let her finish. We were eating breakfast at her house. I had just woken up, and I didn't want to hear it. I knew from her tone of voice that what she had to say was horrible. I knew I had to stop her. I had a raspberry croissant and an espresso and I had her town."
Hmm. That doesn't bode at all well, does it?
The book was an Edgar Award finalist (which is likely why I ordered it initially), as well it was named one of the ten best mystery books and thrillers of the year by the Washington Post, plus Maureen Corrigan (of NPR fame and someone I respect) gave it her thumbs up. So I think my instinct was a good one. I'll let you know how it turns out!