First posted on publication and being shared as part of #SkelfSummer.
How have I come this far in my reading life without reading Doug Johnstone? The Skelfs are the family I didn’t even know I was missing. To prepare for reading the second novel in Johnstone’s Skelf series, I made the decision to read the first novel entitled A Dark Matter. I couldn’t have imagined this incredible group of women, but now I feel like I know them personally. Set within the city of Edinburgh, this is a family of undertakers and private investigators. Just to set up the kind of family they are, the author places their residence and place of work at No 0 – somewhere that doesn’t exist. Grandmother Dorothy is a Californian lured to Edinburgh after falling in love with Jimmy Skelf who has passed away at the beginning of book one. Dorothy works in the funeral business with employee Archie, but also takes on PI duties and in her spare time teaches spunky young girls to play the drums. Mum Jenny is at a loose end so comes into the family business after her father dies. She jumps into the PI business with both feet, which is how she seems to do most things. Granddaughter Hannah is studying physics at Edinburgh University and lives with her girlfriend Indy. She has a good relationship with her parents and her grandmother. The first book concerns the disappearance of Hannah’s uni friend Mel and the shock when her killer is revealed is seismic, hitting all the Skelf family hard.
The beginning of The Big Chill reads like the explosive ending of most books. In a scene as comical as it is tragic, Dorothy and Archie are overseeing a routine funeral at the cemetery when sirens start moving closer and drowning out the service. The guests and undertakers stare aghast as a van driven at high speed forces its way through the cemetery gates followed by the police. As the van careers towards them, mourners start to scatter and Dorothy narrowly misses being ploughed into ground, as the van speeds straight into the grave nose first. Dorothy clambers in to check on the driver and finds he has died instantaneously from a head injury. However, what does survive is a scruffy Collie dog she names Einstein to sit alongside Schroedinger the cat. She immediately offers the Skelfs’ services for the man she names Jimmy X but she would like to find a little more out about him before she conducts his funeral. So, Dorothy sets out, with Einstein in tow, to find out how Jimmy X ended up living in a van that literally ‘ended up’ in an open grave.
Of course, this is only one of the mysteries the women are investigating. Hannah makes friends with an elderly physics professor at university when he asks if she’ll help with a memorial for Mel. Not long after they are performing dual duties for him too, when he dies suddenly and unexpectedly. Hannah can’t accept his death and even if it is just a displacement activity, begins to look into his personal life for answers. Dorothy is overstretched with cases when one of her drumming students doesn’t turn up for practice. This is so unusual because Abi loves to drum and has never missed a lesson. When she visits Abi’s home she is told that she was unwell, but Dorothy senses an undercurrent in the air and eventually finds our that Abi has run away. In order to find her, 70 year old Dorothy will have to start thinking like a 14 year old girl, which isn’t easy when the back ache doesn’t go away as quickly as it used to. The scars of her assault in the previous novel are not just mental.
Hanging over them all is the trial of Mel’s killer, known intimately to the Skelf women and still keeping a hold over them where he can. Not only did he kill the pregnant Mel but when found out he attacked Jenny. He stabbed her in the stomach and beat Dorothy too. He has found a psychiatrist to claim he was incapacitated by mental illness at the time of the original killing. Even worse he lures Jenny to visit him, then presses charges when she assaults him. In the aftermath, Hannah is drowning. She’s well supported by Indy, but can’t sleep, feels anxious and when under pressure has panic attacks and passes out. It may take a seismic change to shake her from personalising all these difficult life experiences and thinking she is the only victim. She is having counselling, but there’s so much to unpick and she is in danger of ignoring the one person who helps her most. The women usually gather at the end of the day in the kitchen and catch each other up on the days events, but when even that ritual starts to fall apart Dorothy knows her family are stretched to breaking point. Yet, everyone has to heal in their own time and in their own way. She is wondering whether there is life after Jimmy, and whether her long held friendship and working relationship with a certain Swedish police officer, could become more?
These women are great characters. They’re tough, but still vulnerable. Full of quirky detail and boundless energy. They are also wonderfully good at picking up ‘waifs and strays’. They try not to judge people. I loved Jenny, trekking round homeless shelters and approaching groups in the street, but stopping to pass the time of day or joining them in beer. As someone who is also very good at collecting people, I know how much it widens horizons, teaches us about our own preconceptions and sometimes brings unexpected but wonderful friends. Their arms and their home are open. I found myself thinking a lot about the wonderfully patient and wise Indy, who comes into contact with the Skelfs as a teenager organising her parents funeral after a car accident. She is always quietly working in the background: cooking mouthwatering curries when Hannah hasn’t eaten; taking the reins at funerals when private investigating takes over; listening to bereaved family and respecting the person who died with so much attention to detail. There are such hidden depths here and I found myself hoping that’s explored more in later novels.
I loved the Edinburgh backdrop. In fact it becomes a character in its own right from the touristy areas, to the student quarter, to the areas that missed regeneration, this is such a varied and richly atmospheric city. I don’t know it well but I feel this has taken me under that tourist facade to find something more interesting. We also see such a variety of people from those on the streets to those who in academia or in private education. Death is a great leveller though and these people are often side by side once they reach Skelf’s undertakers. We also see that these extremes can all be found in one person; there isn’t a ‘type’ that becomes homeless or commits a murder. I also find the way Hannah makes sense of her world through science really interesting. She muses on quantum suicide and whether we, like Schroedinger’s Cat, can be alive and dead at the same time. People often think that science is anathema to concepts like faith, hope and a belief in God. However, there is beauty and wonder in everything Hannah knows about space.
What I take away most from this book is the way the author writes with bluntness, but also kindness, acceptance and wonder about the human condition and the strange galaxy we call home. Hannah muses on the end of the universe with her counsellor:
‘stars will stop forming, the sun will wink out, the solar system will collapse. Then in the black-hole era galaxies disband, all proton matter decays, supermassive black holes swallow everything, then they’ll evaporate too, all the energy and matter in the cosmos gone […] it’s called the big chill’.
Hannah comments that it’s not such a bad way to go, but her counsellor reminds her that it’s a long way into the future. Dorothy has the same thoughts as her mind is flooded with images of everything they’ve experienced. She has felt the cold, icy creep of death:
‘death so close that she could feel its breath on her neck, could smell it every day when she woke, could feel its icy touch spreading from her mind to her limbs’.
So she sits behind her drums, plays the Black Parade album by My Chemical Romance, and starts to tap out a rhythm until she can feel the music within her, warming her veins and bursting to life. While we’re here we have to find a way to keep living.
Shared as part of #SkelfSummer
Meet the Author
Doug Johnstone is the author of fifteen novels, most recently The Space Between Us (2023). Several of his books have been bestsellers, The Big Chill (2020) was longlisted for the Theakston Crime Novel of the Year, while A Dark Matter (2020), Breakers (2019) and The Jump (2015) were all shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year. He’s taught creative writing and been writer in residence at various institutions over the last two decades including festivals, libraries, universities, schools, prisons and a funeral directors.
Doug is a Royal Literary Fund Consultant Fellow and works as a mentor and manuscript assessor for many organisations, including The Literary Consultancy, Scottish Book Trust and New Writing North. He’s been an arts journalist for over twenty years and has also written many short stories and screenplays. He is a songwriter and musician with six albums and three EPs released, and plays drums for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers, a band of crime writers. He’s also co-founder of the Scotland Writers Football Club.
This fascinating debut is set in 1920’s Chicago and concerns an heiress called Penelope ‘Nelly’ Sawyer, described by the author as the ‘wealthiest Negro in America’. Her father, Ambrose Sawyer, has managed to catapult his family into the upper echelons of black society. Nelly is getting over the death of her brother Elder, who has been killed in a road accident but her mother wants her to attend a Cotillien in the city at the end of summer. This is the American equivalent of a Debutante Ball, where the most prominent young women in society are presented in high society. Suddenly, and against her wishes, Nelly becomes the season’s ‘diamond’ – to use a Bridgerton term. This honour means that Nelly is now the most eligible young woman in society, but her ambitions don’t end at a society marriage. For the past year she has been indulging her passion for journalism, researching and anonymously submitting articles to a Black-run newspaper called The Chicago Defender. Her brother Elder was her co-conspirator and sounding board for her articles. He was the go-between, taking Nelly’s articles to the editor Richard Norris. Now she faces a choice, not only is she unexpectedly involved in a love triangle, she must decide to reveal her true identity to the newspaper, or allow her journalistic ambitions to end.
I really enjoy a plucky and transgressive heroine, so I was immediately on Nelly’s side. She’s been looking into the underworld of Chicago society and the leader of an organised crime group called the Mayor of Maxwell Street. This is the prohibition era and the dark but glamorous world of the secret ‘speakeasy’. She has already met one club owner through her brother. Jay Shorey is intriguing and first caught her eye at Elder’s funeral, where they seemed to spark a mutual attraction despite the unusual surroundings. Jay is the archetypal bad boy, but does find many young people from high society visit his club. He doesn’t have their family connections but has access to so many people in Chicago through the club and his ‘god-uncle’ who is a bit of a gangster. His ability to move between the darker parts of Chicago society and her own, more elevated, circles means he’s invaluable to Nelly and her investigations, but is there more to their relationship than that? Yet he isn’t the only suitor on the horizon.
As Nelly bursts onto the socialite scene, she meets Tomás Escalante y Roche at a polo match. He is one of the polo players with an uncle who is a French marquis, and a father who “owns half of Mexico” according to the wonderfully sardonic and witty Sequoia McArthur. Tomás rides a horse that Nelly happened to raise on the Sawyer ranch and she doesn’t mind giving her sharp feedback on what he’s doing wrong! Needless to say he isn’t used to hearing such criticism, especially from a young woman but her honesty makes her memorable. Tomás is hooked and he intends to court her. As far as Nelly’s family are concerned she’d be crazy not to reciprocate his affections and should jump at the chance to come out of the Cotillion summer with a fiancé. So, it’s a bit of a love triangle but also a young woman’s choice between the the life she wants and the life her family wants for her. I was rooting for her.
She chooses to face things head on by meeting Her editor in a cafeteria, and has to convince him that yes, she did write the articles. However, she comes up against a very sharp reality. Norris tells her he can’t publish articles under her real name because of her family’s position in society. He knows that the Ambrose Sawyer would soon be knocking on his door if he did. Nelly is so disappointed that Norris makes a deal. He gives her an assignment and if she succeeds he promises she can publish under her own name. Of course it’s impossible. He tells her about the Mayor of Maxwell Street, a secretive figure in gangland who seems to have achieved the impossible and brought different organisations together across the race divide. Usually Irish, Italian, Jewish and Black gangsters are having turf wars and killing each other, but that’s stopped and he thinks this new Mayor is behind it. He tells Nelly that if she can correctly identify this man he will publish her article and take the consequences of using her real name. Of course she accepts his challenge.
This is a page turner and it’s impossible not to like Nelly and admire her guts. I over the way the author handled the attitudes and outright racism of a hundred years ago. She even highlights the experiences of diverse characters on a spectrum of issues, such as poverty, class, education and skin tone. Jay’s relatively light skin enables him to ‘pass’, yes it opens doors but then you’re participating with your own oppressor. Nelly is very disapproving of living life on those terms. Jay is mixed race and he explains to her:
“There are two candy jars, right? One marked for Negroes, and one for white folk. The Negro — under penalty of death — can only take from one jar. The white man, though, he can take from one or the other. He can take from both. Never mind that the jars have the exact same candy; the white man still gets to choose. That is all I want, Nelly. The freedom to choose. I don’t want to look like them, or act like them, or be them. But I want their options.”
These issues come organically from the characters and they’re inclusion really add some weight to the historical background of the novel. Her depiction of Chicago in the 1920’s feels authentic, rather than the stylised razzle dazzle of the musical, but they come from the same world. There’s even a nod to The Great Gatsby too. This is an entertaining novel with a plucky heroine and some gravitas behind the compelling story and a compulsive need to keep reading. I look forward to seeing what the author does next.
Out Now from Thorndike Press
Meet the Author
Avery Cunningham is a resident of Memphis, TN, and a 2016 graduate of DePaul University’s Master of Arts Writing & Publishing program. She has over a decade of editorial experience with various literary magazines, small presses, and best-selling authors. Avery grew up surrounded by exceptional African-Americans who strived to uplift their communities while also maintaining a tenuous hold on prosperity in a starkly segregated environment. The sensation of being at once within and without is something she has grappled with since childhood and explores thoroughly in her work of historical fiction. When not writing, Avery is adventuring with her Bernese Mountain Dog, Grizzly, and wading waist-deep in research for her next novel. She aspires to tell the stories of complex characters fighting for their right to exist at the fringes of history. THE MAYOR OF MAXWELL STREET is her debut novel.
Pine Ridge is a small coastal village off the south coast, somewhere near Bournemouth and has that castaway feeling from the moment you cross on the car ferry. However, this idyllic village is the setting for discontent and divided loyalties between those DFL (down from London) residents and those who have grown up in Pine Ridge and mainly work servicing those August visitors. The ridge has a resort hotel, beach bar and spa to keep holiday makers happy, but some visitors have gone away dreaming of their own little slice of south coast heaven. One summer Pine Ridge becomes the centre of a dispute over second home ownership. This is a bad time for Amy and Linus who have just bought their own little bungalow with coastal views up on the ridge. It needs work, having been the home of an elderly couple, but she has a plan and builders starting this summer. She was inspired by friend Charlotte whose banker husband Perry used a huge bonus to buy their perfect holiday home with it’s own summer house overlooking the sea, nicknamed The Nook. It’s people like this that friends Robbie and Tate are angry about. They grew up here but are stuck living in static caravans on a temporary site because they can’t afford to buy or rent anywhere. The private rental market has shrunk as people refurb for the AirBnB market and no new houses are being built. People on service wages can’t hope to pay the prices of houses on the ridge, so they’re snapped up by Londoners who only come in August. This leaves huge homes empty all year while villagers are homeless, this is why the men have set up the NJFA – ‘Not Just For August’ Campaign. As tensions rise towards the August bank holiday, the NJFA are gearing up to make their final public protest of the summer. As the music festival gears up on the beach, people are interested in the design they’ve created on the sand, but they’re stopped in their tracks when half way through the day a summer house is bulldozed from the cliff and into the sea. Was this the NJFA plan all along or is something else going on?
Louise Candlish is brilliant at satirising the middle classes and she’s hit upon an issue that holiday destinations around the world are facing. I’ve always visited Venice in winter or early spring because I can’t stand cruise crowds and I was emotionally drawn in by the problem of keeping that balance between tourists and residents. They’ve addressed the cruise ship issue in recent years, have set up campaigns that show tourists which are the authentic Venetian restaurants and shops rather than the tourist traps. Authorities are now considering curbing numbers. Otherwise, it will become little more than a Disneyland experience; can Venice be the city it is, without it’s people? It’s a problem that areas like Devon and Cornwall have faced for years, with second home owners and holiday cottages turning whole villages into ghost towns in the winter. Even worse, it means the opinions of people who are not even year round residents, hold more sway in local matters than people trying to earn their livelihood. This came to the fore a few years ago in Cornwall where local fishermen’s need for a new jetty was being blocked by second home owners objecting to the planning application. There is always a tipping point and Candlish has demonstrated that exquisitely here. I had so much sympathy for Tate and his girlfriend Ellie, working in the beach bar and spa but not able to buy a home where they were born. They finished long shifts, only to broil all night in the heat of a static caravan. Tate’s friend Robbie is determined to take action and his NJFA campaign starts with throwing eggs and soup at DFL cars at the ferry stop. He pushes his agenda at council meetings and in the press, especially when he parks his caravan on the drive of a Pine Ridge home that’s been empty all year.
When we meet the DFL families their privilege is apparent. Candlish has this brilliant way of creating the stereotype we expect then subverting it. Perry is the archetypal banker – big car, egocentric and totally unapologetic about his banker’s bonus that allowed him to buy their holiday home and retire early. It’s easy to find fault with him; the drinking, the toxic masculinity and the absolute rejection of the type of ‘woke’ causes the younger people are hung up on. His son Benedict has brought girlfriend Tabitha to Pine Ridge, but she’s so ‘woke’ that she gets under Perry’s skin. Her sympathy for the NJFL cause grinds his gears, especially when she criticises his lifestyle while happy to enjoy the benefits for herself. Perry is simply incapable of keeping the peace, tearing up to the caravan park to give Robbie a piece of his mind and his fists. He’s also irritated by Linus, who is more aware of his impact on the world and travels everywhere in the village by bicycle. Perry finds his middle-aged Lycra wearing ridiculous and vents much of his rage on him and his bike. Yet there’s another side to Perry, a fear of being who he really is perhaps? He’s on the wagon after years of alcoholism and has formed an attachment to a resident at the halfway house for addicts where he volunteers in London. Charlotte is suspicious of his weekly drives back up to the city, but it’s fair to say doesn’t suspect the identity or gender of the object of his affections. It’s clear that Perry’s lies are starting to stack up and he won’t be able to hold his perfect life together for very long.
Another interesting character is Linus and Amy’s daughter Beatrice, who at 17 has blossomed into a goddess, something her mother realises when she sees her on the beach in a bikini. Beatrice could be an rich bitch, totally unaware of how privileged she is. Of course they’re not as well off as Perry and Charlotte, but still they can afford to renovate the bungalow as a second home and she has the usual teenage accoutrements of manicured nails, the latest iPhone and enough clothing to dress the whole family. Underneath Beatrice doesn’t seem happy though and when Charlotte notices a wrap she’s wearing on the beach is genuine designer and not the Vinted fake she claimed it was, her mind starts whirring. Where is Beattie getting the money for all these designer items? Candlish has all the right brands here including the designer collaboration Birkenstocks. It turns out that Beattie has a way of acquiring her goods that is less than savoury. I was expecting OnlyFans or an online sugar daddy! Yet what does Amy expect when she’s already going out of her way to keep up with Charlotte and Perry? It’s something that’s very apparent when she purchases her own summer house to sit overlooking the bay and christens it The Niche. Beattie has other secrets too, involving the The Niche and a certain beach barman. All hell will break loose if Linus finds out that this man, with a pregnant girlfriend, is hanging around his daughter. Tate is feeling ever more desperate and utterly trapped. He can’t bear the idea of the winter in the confines of their static with a screaming baby. He isn’t ready. While Ellie is planning to tell her parents and lobbying the council for more permanent housing, he is meeting his teenage lover and planning his escape.
There are so many strands to this story that by the time the summer house slides off the cliff and onto the beach I had no idea who had done it. The shockwaves ripple through the villagers when the police find a body in the wreckage and start a murder enquiry. Tate knows he and Robbie will be in the frame for their activist antics and their ability to use a bulldozer. I couldn’t help but think that it wouldn’t be as simple as that. Despite their circumstances driving them to criminal behaviour, they really aren’t bad boys. My money was on one of the DFL crowd: had Charlotte found out about Perry’s extra-curricular activities? Was Beattie so scared of her secrets coming to light she’d silenced someone? Had Perry been driven to distraction by Linus and his bike? We didn’t even know whose summer house was wrecked at first. This labyrinth of possibilities slowly unravels, including some fascinating twists and turns. I loved how Candlish highlighted a very real injustice, while weaving a unputdownable thriller around it. I genuinely felt for locals having to sofa surf, while huge houses stood empty all year. To then add insult to injury they then have to earn their money servicing these families and their houses, providing their massages in the spa and listening while they complain about their busy lives and seeing how much they spend without thinking on their food and drink. I could see why they were angry and it was interesting to see how those inequalities lead to other ideologies – when locals find out that asylum seekers might be housed nearby they are incensed. Their antipathy comes from fear that someone will jump them in the queue, but they’re missing who the real enemy is. Everybody has to do a lot of learning as we rush towards her conclusion, there’s some learning around respecting differing opinions, understanding why the other person thinks like they do and finding ways of working together. This is a fabulously current morality tale with some delicious satire and lots of secrets to uncover. The perfect summer read.
Out Now in Hardback from HQ
Meet the Author
Hello and welcome! You join me as my new thriller OUR HOLIDAY is published – it is out now in paperback, ebook and audio and was just announced as a Richard & Judy Book Club pick for the summer! It features my favourite ever love-to-hate characters (wait till you meet Perry and Charlotte!), second home owners in an idyllic beach resort who think they’re in town for another summer of sun, sea and rosé… But instead, they’re in for a bit of a reckoning…
I’m also celebrating my 20th year as an author this summer – that’s right, my first book came out in 2004, which somehow manages to feel both like yesterday AND a hundred years ago.
OUR HOUSE is the one you may know me for as it’s on our screens as a major four-part ITV drama starring Martin Compston, Tuppence Middleton and Rupert Penry-Jones (watch the full series free on ITVX). This is the novel that turned my career around – right when I was about to give up. It won the 2019 British Book Awards Book of the Year – Crime & Thriller and was shortlisted for the Goldsboro Books Glass Bell Award, the Capital Crime Amazon Publishing Best Crime Novel of the Year Award, and the Audible Sounds of Crime Award. It was also longlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award and the Specsavers National Book Awards.
It recently received a Nielsen Bestseller Silver Award for 250,000 copies sold and I feel so proud that readers are continuing to discover it and recommend it far and wide.
My 1990s-set thriller THE ONLY SUSPECT just won the 2024 Capital Crime Fingerprint Award for Thriller of the Year and I was recently nominated for a CWA Dagger in the Library Award, voted for by librarians and readers.
OUR HOLIDAY, THE ONLY SUSPECT, THE OTHER PASSENGER, THE SWIMMING POOL and THE DAY YOU SAVED MY LIFE have all been optioned for the screen – I’ll share development news on those as soon as I can.
A bit about me: I live in a South London neighbourhood not unlike the one in my books, with my husband, daughter (when she’s not at uni), and a fox-red Labrador called Bertie who is the apple of my eye. Books, TV and long walks are my passions – and drinking wine in the sun with family and friends. My favourite authors include Tom Wolfe, Patricia Highsmith, Barbara Vine and Agatha Christie.
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Wow! That was a busy book month. I read so much and enjoyed pretty much every book I read, but these were the stand outs for me this month. I think a combination of having a really painful back and the recent heatwave has meant a lot of resting and time to read. In fact I’ve read so much this month I’m slightly behind on reviews. My NetGalley account is looking seriously neglected though and one of my priorities for next month is to get some of those choices reviewed and tidied away. I hope you’re all enjoying the weather. I’m surgically attached to my new Shark fan which is so quiet I don’t feel like a jet engine is taking off next to the bed! Multiple Sclerosis and heat don’t mix well so I try and keep cool with cold drinks, a cooling mat, cooling spray and frozen strawberries or iced fruit lollies. I’m pretty much guaranteed to be having an afternoon nap each day too. I’m expecting similar conditions next month so lots more reading time. Here are some mini reviews of my June reading:
This excellent contemporary short story collection features an interlinked group of young Black British people. It opens strongly with an introduction to one woman’s tube ride to work and the emotions that arise when she sees an eligible man reading her favourite book. It sets the tone for the whole book with a narrative voice that’s immediate and modern. Reading this as a 50 year old in my rural village opens up a much younger generation to me and reminded me of the way my stepdaughters communicate – across so many social media apps I can barely keep up. There are bittersweet feelings of regret and love, the realisation that sometimes love isn’t enough. I loved the way that each story bled into the next, so while we meet a character like Jonathon in the context of the girl who’s always loved him in a later story we can see him visit Ghana with friends discussing how hard it is to be a young black man in Britain. So we know there’s so much more to him than at first appearance. I also love that these stories come full circle in an unexpected way within the final story. This beautiful writing is so immediate with no superfluous words or descriptions. My full review will be up this week.
I’ve never read a Jane Cory novel but was intrigued by the premise of this story revolving around a historic case. Janie tells us ‘on the day I died the sea was exceptionally flat’. She’s a young girl on the verge of exciting life changes, she’s been offered a publishing job in London. It’s something she has always wanted to do and she’s had a last early morning swim. Afterward she starts to cycle home when a 4×4 hurtles round the corner and knocks her off her bike causing horrendous injuries. Janie survives but is severely disabled, struggling to even communicate until she realises that although she can’t speak, she is able to sing. Years later, music legend Robbie is arrested for the offence. The clean living band member, then solo artist, wants to plead guilty but his solicitor is sure there’s something he’s not saying. Victim support volunteer Vanessa is assigned to Janie throughout the court process. Now a widow, she has spent most of her life unwittingly controlled by her husband. Her secret heartbreak is that she couldn’t have children because after a fall when pregnant she sadly had a stillborn baby that didn’t see due to being so unwell. So when a young man turns up claiming to be her grandson it throws her whole life into confusion. Luckily she has Judge, who she’s built up a friendship with after meeting at court, but he has his on secrets too. There are so many tangled threads in the stories of these people who revolve around a single court case. I was compelled to keep reading as the questions started to pile up and revelations came thick and fast. This was an interesting thriller with four narrators taking us into their own inner worlds and slowly revealing it’s darkest secrets.
I loved this story of a marriage gone wrong from Moa Herngren, set in Stockholm. Our narrator is Bea, the wife in this divorce, who is angry with husband Niklas because he forgot to buy the ferry tickets to take them on holiday. Bea does everything else so why couldn’t he remember this one thing? Now they’ll be stuck in the city for another week in the heat or they’ll have to take a car and drive to a different ferry. Bea is sometimes exasperated with her husband who has started a new job as doctor in a maternity department, in fact she even picked out the job for him knowing that he would happily stay working in paediatrics in their local hospital for life. If she didn’t push him he wouldn’t fulfil his potential and they’d never have a new kitchen. Niklas and Bea met as teens when Bea’s brother Jacob started to hang out with him. When Jacob killed himself both of them were grieving and he felt a natural pull towards Bea, wanting to look after her. They’ve been together for thirty years and have two teenage daughters Alexia and Alma. Niklas suddenly distances himself from Bea saying he’s not coming home, saying he needs some space. Bea is bewildered by his behaviour. Is it a mid-life crisis? He gets a tattoo and starts to rent an apartment belong to the Ericssons down the road. Bea doesn’t know what she’s done wrong and he won’t communicate, but she’s terrified because if she loses him she loses His family too – the only family she’s known. We’re team Bea at this point and then the author switches to Niklas’s point of view at the half-way point. This is a clever and subtle story of something many of us experience, but shown from two different and fascinating perspectives.
I loved The Phonebox at the Edge of the World and the idea of a place to go and talk to your lost people. It’s a ritual. A point and place of connection where all your anger and grief can be expressed. Then when you put the phone down and leave the box, you leave those feelings behind. Catharsis is very important, but as time goes on so is containment. It allows people to grieve, but at a time and place of their choice. Shuichi is an artist who returns to her home town of Kamakura after the death of her mother to do carry out the administrative tasks that follow a death, but also to sort her belongings. As she starts to sort the contents of her mother’s house into boxes in the garage, she isn’t expecting to find a young boy in there, going through the boxes and taking items out. As a friendship grows between Shuichi and this boy called Kenya, Shuichi’s parental feelings are stirred up by this new child in her life. Children are very healing, because they’re a beginning rather than an end, experiencing the world for the first time with joy and wonder. This book is about the inner journey and the human process of change. There are moments of exquisite descriptions and a philosophical element. It’s one of those books where you find yourself going back to re-read a sentence that’s so beautiful it stops you in your tracks. Although it starts with a feeling of sadness, I felt uplifted at the end. There’s nothing overwrought it sentimental about it either, and it’s because the writer has such a gentle touch that the full impact of the emotions really surprise you. I felt changed by this story and that’s how powerful literature can be.
It seems a long time since I last accompanied Jensen on her investigative adventures, so I was very pleased to receive a proof for this third instalment. As usual this was a complex plot involving politics, organised crime, hackers and headless bodies being fished out of the water. Jensen fears that one of the bodies might belong to a Syrian refugee named Aziz who was working as security for MP Esben Nørregaard, one of her friends. Esben asks Jensen and her assistant Gustav to look into it for him as he doesn’t yet want to involve the police. Meanwhile, detective Henrik Jungersen and his team try to find out who the bodies belong to and where their heads have gone. This complicated investigation means that Jensen and Henrik are going to cross paths. Jensen is in a good place, after a round of redundancies at her newspaper Dagbladet she has become chief crime reporter. Also, she has just moved in with her tech billionaire boyfriend Kristoffer Bro. Henrik can’t believe that Jensen has left him behind for good. He’s still married, just barely, and is due to go on holiday to Italy with his family when the first body is found. Guiltily he can’t imagine anything worse than the holiday, but if he doesn’t go he knows it’s probably the last straw for his long suffering wife and that’s before she knows Jensen is involved in his case. Jensen still feels slightly odd in Kristoffer’s flat and when she starts to look for something of Kristoffer’s that’s personal I could understand why, even if it is an invasion of his privacy. Jensen’s investigative urge could come between them and up until now this is the healthiest relationship she’s ever had. Henrik has never made himself available, but that attraction is still there. The story is compelling, well-structured and there were revelations I wasn’t fully expecting. What’s fascinating about Jensen is that by instinct she’s a lone wolf, suspicious of everyone and very headstrong. Yet she seems to be slowly collecting people in her work and private life. I think these ties make her feel vulnerable, but she’s starting to realise that without them she’d be in a much worse place. The ending was tooth-clenchingly tense and I’m already looking forward to their next adventure.
It seems to be a year of incredible debuts and this one is definitely going to stay with me. We open at a dinner party. Robyn and her wife Cat are hosting an evening for their friends Willa and Jamie, Robyn’s brother Michael and his partner Liv, and Cat’s brother Nat and his new girlfriend Claudette. It’s the first time the group will meet Claudette and Robyn hopes to make it a chilled, relaxed evening. Robyn had a scholarship for a private girl’s school and she ‘buddied’ with Willa who was a new sixth former. Robyn soon learns that Willa’s life is overshadowed by the disappearance of her sister Laika. Michael’s girlfriend Liv is a psychologist and she begins a discussion about implicit and explicit memories. Our explicit memories include times, dates and places and they tend to be from older children. Implicit memories are usually from unconscious emotional recollections and can be an amalgamation of several memories, as well as a few bits of what others have told us. These are memories created when we’re very small, usually pre-school age. Jamie isn’t convinced and Liv’s assertions seem to unsettle the party. As Jamie gets louder, Willa tells a memory of being tickled until she wets herself. She has always hated being tickled. However, someone in the party knows this isn’t actually Willa’s memory. It’s her sister Laika’s. The psychological dynamics of the dinner party are explored within narratives from Robyn, Willa and Laika. We each carry hidden histories within us and these ones are complex and affected by loss and trauma. While the compelling psychological thriller aspect is concerned with finding out what happened to Laika, I was fascinated with the upbringing of the characters and how they became the adults they are. I loved the analogy of the natural pool where Robin’s parents take everyone to bathe. It’s a direct contrast to the sterile and man made pool at Willa’s childhood home. The natural pool at Robyn’s family home is filled with this self-made family that includes their friends too. Robyn and Michael’s family have so much love that it can easily take in others, old friends and new generations. Their love is like the natural spring that feeds the pool, constantly flowing and endlessly replaced.
I love historical thrillers and this one really is bristling with menace. This novel pulls together so many things I love in one incredible story: the Victorians; a touch of the macabre; a spooky and unique house; a heroine who has her consciousness raised and a simmering tension that builds to a heart hammering conclusion. Bonnie is our heroine, a young woman who resides in St Giles and earns a living running a scam with her lover Crawford and their friend Rex. The trio hang around public houses looking for a man that Bonnie can lure to a quiet alley for sex, only for Crawford and Rex to appear, rough him up and steal anything they can sell on. However, one night as Bonnie lures a red-headed man to their usual place, Crawford and Rex don’t appear. Pressed up against the wall while the man tries to haul up her skirt, she has to fight him off herself. Bonnie knew as soon as head hit brick, he was dead. Crawford tells her lie low and shows her an advert for a lady’s maid at Endellion – a labyrinthine Gothic house on the outskirts of London. Bonnie goes to meet the owner, a Mr Montcrieffe. He’s a widower with a teenage daughter Cissie who desperately misses her mother. Bonnie gets the job and looks forward to working with Cissie. Yet there is so much more to these unrelated events than she knows and so much about Crawford that’s been hidden by her love for him. Now events are set in motion, Bonnie is caught in a spider web of lies, betrayals and the very darkest of intentions. I loved Bonnie’s development through the book, Crawford has definitely underestimated her. She feels trapped by Crawford but he doesn’t have the hold on her he once did. She wants to remove deceit from her life at Endellion. The revelations keep coming in the latter half of the book, some expected and others a complete shock to Bonnie and to us. I felt a physical sensation of holding my breath in parts and I devoured the final three sections in one afternoon, desperate to find out what happened. Bonnie has to be super-resourceful to survive and create a better life for herself. I was desperate for her to succeed! This novel is a brilliant thriller with an atmospheric and beautiful backdrop. We also have a resourceful heroine with more strength and intelligence than she realises. This is an absolute must read for those who love Gothic and historical fiction.
I started this book in bed at night, which turned out to be a big mistake because I didn’t want to go to sleep once I’d started. We’re introduced to the village of Tome (pronounced ‘tomb’ by the locals just to add a sense of foreboding) and the new wellness retreat created there by Francesca Woodland who inherited The Manor and it’s land from her grandfather. Her husband Owen has created woodland ‘hutches’ for guests, featuring outdoor showers and luxurious linens. The Manor itself is the central hub with classes in meditation and yoga, a spa and breakfast area. The opening weekend looms and while there’s a hint of anxiety Fran is sure she has everything under control. On the final night she has planned a mini-festival with live music, a meal out in the woods and crowns fashioned from twigs creating the look and feel of a pagan celebration. While the music is at it’s loudest she has given Owen the go ahead to start digging the foundations for the tree houses, in the hope the music drowns out the noise. However, that’s not the only problem on the horizon because when Owen arrives the workmen are confused by new symbols on the trees. They look like seagulls in flight. By the morning there’s a burned effigy and a body on the beach, a wrecked Aston Martin with blood inside and the manor has been rased to the ground by a ferocious fire. Everyone in Tome knows the local saying- ‘Don’t disturb the birds’. Could Francesca’s dream be over when it had only just begun? The book also goes back twenty years, when Francesca was a teenager living at the manor with her grandparents and twin brothers.
There are several narrators, but there are others who have reason to hate The Manor and some exact their revenge in amusing ways, while others want to end the retreat and Francesca for good. I loved the folk ritual element, reminiscent of Thomas Tryon’s Harvest Home mixed with a dose of Hitchcock’s killer birds. Except these birds are the size of a human, covered in black feathers and under their cloak is the huge beak. The villagers take them seriously, even the contractors who turn up to remove the trees don’t want to mess with those marked by the birds, they’d rather give the money back. Are the birds a simple folk tale that keeps Tome safe or are they real? Tome’s forest and it’s beaches are for the villagers and not to be fenced off for the use of rich visitors. As we countdown to what happened on the big night, two parties twenty years apart reveal their secrets and the birds will have their final say. The ending is terrifyingly final for some, while others will wake up hungover and wondering what exactly they witnessed. As for me, the final page reveal really made me smile.
One week in Cape Cod. The perfect family holiday. What could possibly go wrong…?
Rocky and her husband Nick have reached that middle point in life where adults seem to be at their most stretched. They’re coping with children who have left home or are living at university as well as increasingly elderly parents who need more help than they have before. Rocky is a great narrator because I was comfortable and believed in her world. In fact the book flowed so beautifully that I finished it in a day. The family trip to the Cape Cod holiday home they’ve rented since the children were small throws Rocky’s three generation family under one roof. Eldest child Tim is there with girlfriend Maya and student Willa has travelled from her college and meets them there. Later in the week grandma and grandad will join them for two days and of course there’s the ancient cat. They are rather piled in on tap of one another but they couldn’t come here to a different, bigger rental because so many of their memories have been made in this house. During the week Rocky will learn and divulge some secrets, all of them filtered through her anxiety and what husband Nick jokingly calls a hint of narcissism. Rocky is a passionate and emotionally intelligent mother, the sort of mum you might go to with a secret. She also happy to be schooled where she gets it wrong, especially where daughter Willa is concerned. She might use the wrong pronouns and need to check her privilege occasionally but largely she’s the sort of mum you want. She feels things almost too deeply and I understood that in her. I think Catherine Newman is brilliant when it comes to trauma and intergenerational family dynamics and every family has them. Rocky reminisces about the time she miscarried, the unresolved emotions are clear and perhaps stirred up by menopause symptoms and having her babies under one roof. I loved Rocky and Nick’s marriage too because it’s not perfect – they haven’t really connected for a while, physically or mentally. When he stumbles on a long held secret it throws their dislocation into the spotlight and gives them the opportunity to talk. He still loves her, despite the secrets and narcissism. She recognises that throughout the holiday Nick has been cooking, organising, driving and just quietly looking after everyone. They’ve been in their mum and dad roles for so long they’ve forgotten how to be Rocky and Nick. It’s something of a relief for Rocky to know that Nick still desires her, despite the expanding waistline and loss of libido. Each generation has it’s own issues: the grandparents are facing health issues, brought into sharp focus when grandma faints at the beach: Rocky’s son and girlfriend are facing some huge life choices; Willa is listening and helping where she can. Catherine Newman has once again written a novel about family that is truthful, funny and life-affirming. I can easily see this being on my end of year list because it’s raw, emotional and relatable.
If you haven’t had the pleasure of meeting Tracy Whitwell’s character Tanz yet, you’ve been missing out. This bold, sweary Geordie actress and accidental medium is a delight and this is her third adventure in the series. Tanz is being torn in two directions as she reluctantly agrees to do a fringe play in London, but is also suddenly ‘activated’ as her spirit guide Frank explains. She is sent a new guide who she calls ‘Soft Voiced Lass’ and her flat is suddenly teeming with visions and apparitions, including a nurse who is on duty and walks through into Tanz’s bedroom which is quite a feat when you don’t have any legs! Luckily she has friend and fellow medium Sheila to rely on, but there’s a lot of sleeping with the light on. Tanz is guided down to Southwark and a cemetery known as Cross Bones, the burial place of the prostitutes licensed by the Bishop of Winchester. However, Tanz is greeted by a horrific vision of the burial ground in the Victorian period, when overcrowded tenements spread diseases like wildfire and deaths from cholera, typhus and consumption were the daily norm. What Tanz sees isn’t an ordinary graveyard though. The smell hits her first; death, smoke and sewage creates a miasma that seems to cling to your clothes. In the yard Tanz can see a grave digger with a woman screaming at him, when she looks down she can see some fingers and a skull where he has been digging a body up to make room for more. She is overwhelmed and doesn’t really know what her purpose is here, just that it isn’t going to be easy.
I love Tanz because she’s one of the most real people I’ve ever met in a book, despite the spooky stuff that surrounds her. She’s very down to earth, independent and has a few vices. She thinks her visions relate to several generations of the same family. Between the spooky action there’s an injection of dark humour that I really appreciated. I love Tanz’s slightly prophetic phone calls from her ‘mam’ who strangely seems to know when her daughter’s up to something. Thank God she doesn’t find out about the black faced woman, the homeless man and the knife! There’s also a side order of romance in this novel, with a younger police officer stirring up rather unexpected feelings for Tanz. She’s developed some boundaries and her self-worth enough to accept that someone like this could like her. She’s also stopped the habit of keeping her eye on the exit in her romantic affairs. She’s also taking her gift seriously, starting to accept that it’s this type of work that she finds fulfilling. Although, she also makes a radical move in her acting career too. It’s lovely to see Tanz in such a strong position in life, she’s ready to take on the world and I can’t wait for her next adventures.
Judy left England as a teenager and lived with her aunt In New York City. Judy’s mother drummed it into her that it was wise for a woman to have her own money and never rely solely on a man. This lesson was well learned, but without any real qualifications or means of making money Judy has to be more creative. She’s a grifter, stealing here and scamming there. So when she sees a story in a newspaper about a rich resident of Cape Cod becoming a widower, she decides on her next mark. Judy finds her way to a vineyard in the same area, taking a job there and making herself known until the inevitable happens and she meets Rory. She plays it clever, doesn’t ask for anything and is never pushy or monopolises his time. She’s playing the long game because she wants him to fall for her, hook line and sinker. What she didn’t bank on was falling in love with him. When they marry she has access to some of the wealthiest people in the area so she’s easily sneaking the odd item from their home and from other society people to sell on through a fence. When Rory’s asked to hold the local Wine Appreciation Society ball at their chateau in France, Judy is left with a dilemma. Her fence in London is blackmailing her, asking her to provide details of the ball including exits and entrances of the chateau and a guest list of who’s attending. She doesn’t want to help, but when he threatens to tell husband Rory about her past she has no choice. When one of the robbers dies she laments that a young man has died because of her and can’t shake it off. It’s in her French home that Judy receives the phone call, the one she’s dreaded and expected all at the same time. The police are looking into a murder, but is the victim the man in France?
When Judy’s daughter Francesca gets a visit from the police and journalists it’s like a bolt from the blue. She’s a lawyer, in London and is aghast when police inform her that her mother seems to have fled the country and is wanted for murder. Francesca is left bewildered and unsure what to do. The author is very adept at giving out just enough information, drip feeding little clues here and there that keep you reading and keep you guessing. Then, suddenly, she wrong foots you with a different direction. I found Judy so fascinating that Francesca suffered a bit in comparison. She’s the female equivalent of the ruggedly handsome rogue, with a habit of stealing from the rich like a modern day Robin Hood. There is only one woman who suspects Judy might not be all she seems and she won’t let go of her suspicions, even taking them to the grave. I loved the allusions to Lady Audley’s Secret a Victorian ‘sensation’ novel based around the fact that Lady Audley is living a lie. It had pace and excitement just like a contemporary thriller and this book is in that tradition, except the heroine has less to lose, thanks to never relying solely on a man. I was pretty sure that Judy would try her hardest to find a cunning way out. Is it wrong that the thought of her getting away with it made me smile?
This novel is historical fiction, based during the reign of Elizabeth I and James VI of Scotland (James I of England). I knew of James VI’s obsession with witches after studying the Malleus Malificarum at university, the bible for witch finders, describing all the behaviour and characteristics of possible witches. It’s a guide to James VI, who was alarmed by news of witch hunts in Germany. His proposed bride, Princess Anna of Denmark, set sale for Scotland in 1590 and was driven back by catastrophic storms. The storms were blamed on witches in Denmark and when James travelled to meet her in Norway he heard allegations of witchcraft first hand. Around the same time, in North Berwick, a housemaid called Geillis Duncan was accused of sorcery and when tortured she implicated several other witches, allegedly conspiring with the Earl of Bothwell to take the throne from the King. Kate Foster has taken this history and weaves a story from three women’s points of view, giving a feminist slant on the witch trials that killed thousands over the next two centuries. As Kate points out in her historical notes, the majority of these were women over forty. There are three narratives in the book, from women in different positions of society. Princess Anna of Denmark was a young girl of fourteen when he was betrothed to James VI and attempted to reach Scotland with an enormous pressure on her shoulders. They will have a Scottish hand-fasting, if she should please him within the next year he will marry her. If not, she will be ruined for any other marriage and her future looks set to be a life within an abbey. Adding to the pressure, there is a witch burning just before they leave and Anna is compelled to watch, because burnings are a warning to all women.
The renowned witch finder Dr Hemmingsen from Copenhagen assures the king that he has a unique way to identify witches, using a bodkin to prick them and find the devil’s mark on their body. He also sends the king a golden amulet for protection, carved by a man who knows how to ward off evil. It seems signs and charms are only witchcraft when a man says they are. In fact Anna has never heard so much about the practises of witches as she does from the king, regaling her with tales of baby-killing and orgies with man, woman and beast. Her maid Kristen tells Anna that James is becoming a danger, his fervour is a kind of madness and a licence to abuse and degrade women. Anna has a realisation that a woman’s body is never truly her own, no matter what their position in society. Whether you’re a housemaid whose master decides you’re his property, a witch who can be stripped and examined by men who call themselves god-fearing, or a princess whose family hand-fasted her to James Stuart and didn’t ask her if it was what she wanted. Women must work together if they want to survive. These women are strong, but are they intelligent enough to try and outsmart a king? Kate is brilliant with twists and turns, so I wasn’t surprised to find a few revelations towards the end. I was driven to finish to know what happened to all three women and whether any of them would achieve the freedom they craved. This is historical fiction at it’s best.
That’s a lot of fiction for one month. I read around fifteen books in June and had to be choosy, but this tells me there’s a wealth of fantastic fiction out there, especially if you enjoy various different genres as I do. I’m behind in my Squad Pod reading so that’s the focus for July and catching up on my NetGalley reads too. I’m hoping to get my percentage up to 70% over the next couple of months. Here’s a little preview of what I’m hoping to read in July.
A Missing person … a headless corpse … Jensen is on the case.
June, and as Copenhagen swelters under record temperatures, a headless corpse surfaces in the murky harbour, landing a new case on the desk of DI Henrik Jungersen, just as his holiday is about to start.
Elsewhere in the city, Syrian refugee Aziz Almasi, driver to Esben Nørregaard MP has vanished. Fearing a link to shady contacts from his past, Nørregaard appeals to crime reporter Jensen to investigate.
Could the body in the harbour be Aziz? Jensen turns to former lover Henrik for help. As events spiral dangerously out of control, they are thrown together once more in a pursuit of evil, more dangerous than they either could have imagined.
It seems a long time since I last accompanied Jensen on her investigative adventures, so I was very pleased to receive a proof for this third instalment. As usual this was a complex plot involving politics, organised crime, hackers and headless bodies being fished out of the water. Jensen fears that one of the bodies might belong to a Syrian refugee named Aziz who was working as security for MP Esben Nørregaard, a friend of Jensen. Esben asks Jensen and her assistant Gustav to look into it for him as he doesn’t yet want to involve the police. Meanwhile, detective Henrik Jungersen and his team try to find out who the bodies belong to and where their heads have gone. This complicated investigation means that Jensen and Henrik are going to cross paths. Jensen is in a good place, after a round of redundancies at her newspaper Dagbladet she has become chief crime reporter. Also, she has just moved in with her tech billionaire boyfriend Kristoffer Bro. Henrik can’t believe that Jensen has left him behind for good. He’s still married, just barely, and is due to go on holiday to Italy with his family when the first body is found. Guiltily he can’t imagine anything worse than the holiday, but if he doesn’t go he knows it’s probably the last straw for his long suffering wife. That’s before she knows Jensen is involved in his case.
The story is told from both of their perspectives alternately, giving us all the case action but also their private lives too. Inevitably, their paths will cross although Henrik doesn’t know about Aziz’s disappearance at first. When the second body turns up in the harbour it’s clear that this is much more complex than either of them expected. I always find myself very unsure about Henrik. He’s a competent detective even where he doesn’t always play by the rules. Once he knows Jensen is investigating, he can’t get her out of his head. I find their relationship very like those old Rock Hudson – Doris Day movies where they seem to hate each other, but not really. Even though this is a crime novel, there are witty exchanges and Jensen aggravates him to a comical level. This is especially obvious at press conferences where Henrik can be a liability and Jensen can really press his buttons. He’s also furious that she hasn’t told him about the disappearance of Aziz, because he’s a Syrian refugee there are national security implications. The story moves fast and I loved how much Gustav has come on with his investigative skills. He seems to intuitively know what Jensen needs him to do now, but his aunt (and Jensen’s boss) wants him to return to school in the autumn. I think I would miss him if this comes to pass.
I’ve been suspicious of Kristoffer Bro from the start, based on the premise that if something looks too good to be true it usually is. His flat just isn’t Jensen. In fact she’s kept her small flat that she was renting from him and a lot of her stuff is still there. Their shared home is pristine, with clean lines and absolutely zero clutter. Like Jensen I tend to collect piles of books, magazines and other stuff so I certainly couldn’t live in such an austere place. If I go into a home and there are no belongings, nothing to tell me who this person is, it makes me really uncomfortable. When Jensen starts to look for something of Kristoffer’s that’s personal I could understand why, even if it is an invasion of his privacy. How do people get through life without things? However, Jensen’s investigative urge could come between them and up until now this is the healthiest relationship she’s ever had. Henrik has never made himself available, but that attraction is still there. The story is compelling, well-structured and there were revelations I wasn’t fully expecting. What’s fascinating about Jensen is that by instinct she’s a lone wolf, suspicious of everyone and very headstrong. Yet she seems to be slowly collecting people in her work and private life. I think these ties make her feel vulnerable, but she’s starting to realise that without them she’d be in a much worse place. The ending was tooth-clenchingly tense and I’m already looking forward to their next adventure. I want to end with a plea to Muswell Press to release the covers of these books as prints, I need them on my wall at home.
Out now from Muswell Press
Meet the Author
Heidi Amsinck won the Danish Criminal Academy’s Debut Award for My Name is Jensen (2021), the first book in a new series featuring Copenhagen reporter sleuth Jensen and her motley crew of helpers. She published her second Jensen novel, The Girl in Photo, in July 2022, and the third in April 2024. A journalist by background, Heidi spent many years covering Britain for the Danish press, including a spell as London Correspondent for the broadsheet daily Jyllands-Posten. She has written numerous short stories for BBC Radio 4, such as the three-story sets Danish Noir, Copenhagen Confidential and Copenhagen Curios, all produced by Sweet Talk and featuring in her collection Last Train to Helsingør (2018). Heidi’s work has been translated from the original English into Danish, German and Czech.
One night, at Newington House, the Madley family are disturbed by intruders. It’s the mother who first realises someone is outside and calls the police, but it’s a remote location and it will take them some time to arrive. Once the intruders are in the house they accost the mother downstairs and she sees them for the first time, in sheep masks and carrying knives. She tells them to take anything they want, jewellery and antiques, but they haven’t come for that. Now she’s sure she’s going to die. That night the only survivor in the family was the baby, placed in the priest’s hole by their sister waiting quietly for someone to find them. Written in blood on the wall is ‘tell me where it is’. Several years later, Cass is staying with her boyfriend James for the weekend when he suggests they go out for a drive. She’s surprised when he takes her to a hidden manor house on the edge of a village and tells her they’ve come to view it. An agent comes to meet them and shows them around and it’s weirdly still full of contents. The agent explains that it’s owned by a company who hope to turn it into a retreat, and while this is in the planning stage they need someone to caretake the house. They must live in it, as well as looking after and creating an inventory of it’s many contents. James wasn’t going to tell Cass straight away about the house’s sad history, but the agent does and at first Cass isn’t sure she could live somewhere such a violent act occurred. However, they certainly couldn’t afford anything like this normally. James assures her it will be fine and they agree to take on the contract, an easy thing to do in broad daylight on a lovely day, but Cass will be here alone while James is at work. Can a house hold trauma within it’s bricks and mortar or is Cass just being fanciful?
It doesn’t help that Cass’s father is very protective and isn’t sure about James or Newington House. James and Cass met in a club when she was standing in the shadows watching her friend enjoy her hen night and she is surprised when the attractive man she has just met, stands beside her and holds her hand. Yet it feels completely natural, like they’ve held hands before. Since then, her distance from James has been an issue as they can only see each other at weekends and Cass’s father worries about her travelling so far and being away from his watchful eye. It felt Iike there was something we didn’t know about her because her father’s concern seems out of all proportion. We start to learn that Cass has had issues with her mental health and there’s an allusion to her worrying that someone might be watching or stalking her. This really muddies the waters when it comes to knowing what is real and what is imagination as the couple move into Newington House. Cass is the one who has some strange experiences, perhaps because she’s home more than James or maybe because she’s susceptible to suggestion. Or is something more sinister going on and the house is singling her out? The house itself doesn’t feel creepy at first, but there’s always a sense that something more is going on than meets the eye, as if it’s traumatic past is still playing out within it’s walls. Like a faulty video recording that’s imprinted forever, leaving glimpses and feelings behind.
The previous family’s belonging don’t help, with Cass finding a long dark hair in the silver hairbrushes on her dressing table and the name Rose scribbled on a piece of paper that’s been left in the family suggestion box. The clock in the hall seems to keep stopping at 8.30pm, despite them winding it daily. It’s as if the house has PTSD and keeps experiencing flashbacks. The crime itself is terrifying, the strange addition of sheep’s masks feel so odd and out of place. In between Cass’s narrative we delve into the past with a young girl called Rose who is back at the village after a stint at private school. She doesn’t know many people of her own age in the village and while looking after the baby is fun, she doesn’t want to be a nanny all summer. She takes a walk into the village and meets two boys on the playing field, one of whom is really good looking. I found these sections so bittersweet, because she is a teenager with everything going for her, but we can sense how unsure she is about herself. She hasn’t had many interactions with boys and her innocence leaves her open to exploitation. She desperately wants to be liked, wants her feel that first kiss and know someone desires her. She’s sure to bow to peer pressure all too easily. I thought this character was written beautifully, really conjuring up those awkward teenage feelings. We know the name Rose has a resonance in the house, Cass can sometimes feel a sudden draft and the name comes to mind. Could Rose be the murdered girl at the manor and what is she trying to tell it’s new resident?
I was worried for Cass that perhaps an inexplicable evil lurks at the house, rather like the Overlook Hotel in The Shining where a terrible trauma seems to have infected the very walls of the building compelling residents to repeat history again and again. As the past and present narratives come together there is so much tension. We know the facts of what happened that fateful night but we don’t know the ‘who’ or the ‘why’ because it seems to have come from nowhere. I’m always desperate to know the reasons behind something, more than the whodunnit at times. This is where I felt a little bit lost, because I wanted to know if any of characters was the surviving child but the further we delved into the past the more characters seemed to be involved. My pet theory on why Cass was so vulnerable before meeting James was totally wrong! As we flipped back and forth in time I did have to go back and do some re-reading because I was genuinely confused. There were revelations I didn’t expect at all, adding more aspects to the case and the house than my brain could handle. It was like opening a set of Russian dolls to find that none of them matched the outside. However, the reveal of who was behind the masks was excellent and added an extra layer of danger to the ending. I think the moral of the story is that when you’re offered money to look after a mansion where murders have occurred, think twice. The old adage of ‘if something seems to good to be true it probably is’ really does apply here. I felt the best thing about the book was that sense of foreboding in the place where trauma has occurred, as if the violent acts of that night were imprinted on time like a photograph.
Out now from HQ
Meet the Author
Louise Jensen has sold over a million English language copies of her International No. 1 psychological thrillers ‘The Sister’, ‘The Gift’, ‘The Surrogate’, ‘The Date’, ‘The Family’, ‘The Stolen Sisters’, ‘All For You’ and ‘The Fall’. Her novels have also been translated into twenty-five languages, as well as featuring on the USA Today and Wall Street Journal Bestseller’s List. Her next thriller publishes in Spring 2024.
Louise has been nominated for multiple awards including Goodreads Debut Author Of The Year, The Guardians ‘Not The Booker Prize’, best polish thriller of 2018 and she has also been listed for two CWA Dagger awards. All of Louise’s thrillers are currently under option for TV & film. She has also written short stories for various publications including ‘My Weekly’, ‘Hello’, ‘Best’ and ‘The Sun’, as well as having stories featured in multiple anthologies.
Louise also has a penchant for exploring the intricacies of relationships through writing heart-breaking and uplifting stories under the pen name Amelia Henley. ‘The Life We Almost Had’ and ‘The Art of Loving You’ were international best sellers. ‘From Now On’ is her latest Amelia Henley release.
Louise lives with her husband, children, madcap dog and a rather naughty cat in Northamptonshire. She loves to hear from readers and writers.
I was so lucky to be offered a proof for this book after waxing lyrical about the author’s work on social media and I loved it so much that I’ve already splurged on the Goldsborough Books special edition with the most gorgeous spredges, for my collector’s cabinet. This novel pulls together so many things I love in one incredible story: the Victorians; a touch of the macabre; a spooky and unique house; a heroine who has her consciousness raised and a simmering tension that builds to a heart hammering conclusion. Bonnie is our heroine, a young woman who resides in St Giles and earns a living running a scam with her lover Crawford and their friend Rex. Crawford is handsome and a bit of a dandy as far as their limited means allow. The trio hang around public houses looking for their latest mark, a man that Bonnie can lure to a quiet alley with the promise of sex, only for Crawford and Rex to appear just in time to rough him up and steal anything they can sell on. However, one night as Bonnie lures a red-headed man to their usual place, Crawford and Rex don’t appear. Pressed up against the wall while the man tries to haul up her skirt, she realises they’re not coming and has to fight him off herself. As the mark falls and hits his head, the men suddenly appear but far too late. Bonnie knew that as soon as head hit brick, he was dead. Crawford tells her to leave and lie low, he and Rex will tidy this away. In the aftermath, Crawford shows her an advert for a lady’s maid at Endellion – a labyrinthine Gothic house on the outskirts of London. Maybe she could apply for this job and stay out of sight for a while? Bonnie goes to meet the owner, a Mr Montcrieffe. He’s a widower with a teenage daughter who desperately misses her mother and spends rather more time alone with her scrapbook than is healthy. To her surprise, Bonnie gets the job and looks forward to working with Cissie. Yet there is so much more to these unrelated events than she knows and so much about Crawford that’s been hidden by her love for him. Now events are set in motion, Bonnie is caught in a spider web of lies, betrayals and the very darkest of intentions.
I’ve already read one book this month that deals with this part of London and a burial ground known as Cross Bones where the prostitutes of the Southwark district were buried. Known as the Winchester Geese, due to being licensed by the Bishop of the parish, upon their deaths they were still banned from a burial in consecrated ground. The burial ground then became a place for the poor of the surrounding area to be buried, but in an area overrun with diseases like typhus and cholera it was soon over subscribed. Half decayed bodies were disinterred to make way for the new, with grave diggers losing their respect for the dead and using their bones as skittles and their skulls as balls! When Bonnie sees Mr Montcrieffe’s sketches of a mausoleum for his late wife, she encourages him to build it on an empty patch of land on the edge of the gardens of Endellion. She knows that the rich would pay to take their eternal rest in such beautiful surroundings and away from the miasma of death and sewage in the city. Between them they sketch out a cemetery, with Bonnie creating a planting scheme for the project. She’s inspired by the old greenhouse where she’s been spending her few hours of leisure potting up abandoned orchids and other cuttings. Bonnie also makes a difference with Cissie, who seems happier to have a mother figure in the house and spends more time outdoors. Her scrapbook of imaginary love letters sent from Lord Duggan are left aside for a time. Bonnie even enjoys her time spent with the kitchen maid Annette, building a female friendship that’s been missing from her life. Then there is news from Mr Montcrieffe that he’s received a letter from a man who worked on the cemetery at Highgate recently. He claims to know all the administrative loopholes and potential investors to benefit their endeavours at Endellion and he’s invited to stay. As soon as Bonnie enters the office she knows who their new guest is and the smell of peppermint and aftershave she knows so well fills the room. Crawford is keen to establish himself in the house, like a cancer at it’s centre. Although he claims to wish for Bonnie back in his life, she knows that isn’t the only reason. He wants Endellion and he doesn’t care about the chaos and pain he might cause to achieve his aim.
Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill
The setting is beautifully drawn by the author and modelled on Strawberry Hill, Horace Walpole’s gloriously gothic mansion near Twickenham. It’s a very fitting choice for this story, considering that Horace Walpole was the writer of the very first Gothic novel The Castle of Otranto. With it’s crenellated roof and romanticised interiors Endellion was extended and decorated to the taste of Mr Montcrieffe’s first wife Josephine who drowned in the garden pond. The house is labyrinthine in design with plenty of places to hide out, in fact Bonnie spends a lot of time looking for Crawford and wandering through these rooms following the scent of cigarette smoke or his distinctive aftershave but never quite seeing him. The redecoration of the Montcrieffe’s marital bedroom is done by Cissie but very in her mother’s style with it’s overblown and romantic pink. Only to be expected from a girl who writes imaginary love letters to herself in an ornately decorated scrap book. Bonnie prefers working in the earth, transforming the greenhouse and the cemetery with her more natural planting schemes when compared with Josephine’s fondness for cultivating pineapples. The gardener shows Bonnie the exotic plants grown before, including a Venus fly trap, which he opens up to reveal a partially digested beetle. There’s no more fitting metaphor for the situation Bonnie finds herself in, or for the house itself and it’s ability to draw someone like Crawford in and inspire envy.
Crawford is a classic abuser. He sought out Bonnie, as a girl with no prospects, money or family and using his romantic wiles has love bombed her into depending on him for everything. The death of the man in the alley has allowed him to hold something over her, using her fear of the hangman’s noose and of losing him to manipulate her. The pace of the novel changes when he joins her at Endellion; the fear and excitement of snatching moments together and his desire for her are like a drug. He tells a story of his early years, living in poverty on a barge just down the river from this house and an injustice linked to his parentage. This invokes pity in Bonnie and he hopes it gives him a sentimental Robin Hood feel – he wants to take things that aren’t his legally, but argues that morally he has every right to them. The risky behaviour builds and when Bonnie won’t go along with what he wants he suggests she doesn’t love him, that she’s falling in love with Mr Montcrieffe and when neither of those work he threatens, becoming more menacing than Bonnie has ever seen. He takes the household apart bit by bit, removing those who might oppose him, charming those who are taken in by his looks until his dirty boots are carelessly marking the floors and the furniture as if he owns them.
When he proposes a scheme to Bonnie that will make their situation more permanent and tells her his history with the house she believes that this is the reason he came here and feels obliged to help. However, he reckons on the Bonnie he knows from St Giles not expecting that her time at Endellion might have changed her. I loved Bonnie’s development through the book and Crawford has definitely underestimated her. She has developed self-worth from having the raised status of a steady job, earning honest money and using her skills on the cemetery project with Mr Montcrieffe. His belief in her abilities is touching and improves her self-esteem. She starts to feel a loyalty to him and to Cissie who has brought out strong maternal feelings in Bonnie and mothers always protect their cubs. Yes she feels trapped by Crawford but she’s unhappy with his plans, she wants to remove deceit from her life at Endellion and the constant feeling of being on edge is killing her. I started to wonder whether Crawford didn’t have the same hold over her he once did, she’s questioning his plan and his motives and decides to do some digging of her own. The revelations keep coming in the latter half of the book, some expected and others a complete shock to Bonnie and to us. I felt a physical sensation of holding my breath in parts and I devoured the final three sections in one afternoon, desperate to find out what happened. The scales fall from our eyes at the same time as Bonnie as bit by bit the revelations about Lord Duggan and the scrapbook, Crawford’s nocturnal adventures and even the red- headed man in the alley make us see everything in a new light. Bonnie will have to be super-resourceful to survive and create a better life for herself. I was desperate for her to succeed! This novel is a brilliant thriller with an atmospheric and beautiful backdrop. We also have a resourceful heroine with more strength and intelligence than she realises. This is definitely in my top five books of the year so far and an absolute must read for those who love Gothic and historical fiction.
Out now from Picador
Meet the Author
Elizabeth Macneal is the author of two Sunday Times-bestselling novels: The Doll Factory, which won the 2018 Caledonia Novel Award and has been adapted into a major TV series on Paramount+, and Circus of Wonders. Her work has been translated into twenty-nine languages. Born in Scotland, Elizabeth is also a potter and lives in Twickenham with her family. She can be found on instagram @elizabethmacneal.
We’re back with Detective Elma in the fifth of the author’s Forbidden Iceland series and she is just returning to work from maternity leave when a body is found in a holiday cottage by a lakeside. The victim’s name is Thorgeir, he has grown up in Akranes and in a coincidence typical to small towns, his mother is Elma’s neighbour. The holiday cottage belongs to the family and the evidence suggests Thorgeir was not alone – there were two wine glasses and a lacy thong is found under the bed. He is found in the bed, with stab wounds and the line of a well known hymn written on the wall behind the bed, in blood. With Saever on paternity leave with their daughter Adda, Elma works alongside her boss Hörour to solve the murder. Several leads come to light. Thorgeir was working with his friend Matthías on an exercise and well-being app and had secured a large sum of money as an investment, but from an unexpected source. The hymn is well known, often sung at a popular Christian camp for teenagers and refers to the washing away of sin – had Thorgeir needed such forgiveness? Matthías and his wife Hafdis mentioned a young woman that Thorgeir had been seeing recently, but there is no sign of Andrea anywhere. The friends had often attended camps together as teenagers, but on one such occasion a young man had died out on the lake in the night, in similar circumstances to Thorgeir’s father’s death a few years before. It’s soon clear that many secrets are hidden in Akranes, some of them within Elma’s own home.
I love Elma’s character and what a refreshing change to read about a working woman whose partner is providing the childcare. There’s also none of the usual guilt or tension around her return to work, even as the case becomes more intense and late nights become the norm. She seems to have taken motherhood in her stride and she and Saever seem settled and happy. It’s sad that in the 21st Century this should stand out so much. Usually I read female characters caught between home and work, struggling from lack of sleep and feeling guilty. It’s great to see a woman who is a new mum, as well as a competent detective. The mothers in this novel and their relationships with their children were incredibly complex and psychologically fascinating. I was intrigued by Thorgeir’s elderly mother Kristjana, who happens to live next to Elma and Saever. She’s known as a drinker and is familiar to most people as the owner of a dry cleaners in town. She and Thorgeir didn’t seem close, but she had helped him financially. Was this out of love or guilt? There was something fishy about the business’s finances too, a thread that Höreur picked up and investigated. Kristjana’s home isn’t lavish and she doesn’t look like someone with the sort of money the accounts suggest. Saever finds her behaviour bizarre, even to the point of having to intervene one afternoon when he notices she’s dancing naked with the curtains open. She’s had tablets and alcohol, possibly due to grief and hinting at a troubled inner life but when questioned there’s a wall she puts up that’s metres and years thick. Hafdis is also a fascinating character, she asks for a divorce at the beginning of the book but where has she found the money to move on so quickly. Her relationship with Matthías is already over in her eyes, but I was shocked by her coldness towards her daughter Olof. The family have been having therapy, because Olof has been self-harming but Hafdis doesn’t even seem to have factored her daughter into her plans. Olof confides in her father about her mother, not that she gives her a hard time but that she looks at her daughter as if she’s nothing. What else might such a ruthless woman be capable of?
Saever is at home, but when he’s unpacking he comes across a box that doesn’t belong to them. In fact it belongs to previous residents, full of school exercise books and a holiday journal from the very year that the boy was killed on the lake. It belongs to Mani, one of the group staying in the same cabin as the dead boy, alongside Heioar, Hafdis, Thorgeir and Matthías. This draws him into the investigation and Elma isn’t surprised to find him at the station researching, while bouncing Adda on his knee. I loved the little Icelandic details on child care, such as wrapping the baby up warmly then popping them in the open air for a sleep. I didn’t expect to enjoy Elma working without Saever, but I really enjoyed Höreur being a part of the investigation and found myself amused by his grumpiness. His hip injury brings out a resistant and stoic side to his character, the pain making him increasingly snappish. The case has so many twists and turns that it’s hard to put down and little clues that seem to snag in your brain. I spent most of the book wondering about a second large bloodstain in Thorgeir’s family cottage, strategically covered with a rug. I was sure it was important and every time we got closer to the truth I kept thinking ‘but what about the bloodstain?’
Elma is perfect for the more complex investigative work because she occupies a liminal space in town, she’s both known and not known. Having been born in Akranes and having family that goes back generations in the town, there’s an element of belonging that gets her in the door. However, she’s spent her career so far in Reykjavik meaning she isn’t so involved that she can’t ask difficult questions. She doesn’t have the deference to the elders of the town that others might so she’s bold and doesn’t mind stirring things up a little. She definitely riles the old police chief Otto, so much so that he lets his true nature show. He is so angry that he verbally attacks Elma where it really hurts referring to her previous partner’s suicide and implying she should look closer to home for people who are keeping secrets. It sometimes feels like every home in Akranes holds an ocean of pain and unresolved trauma. There’s so much going on just under the surface, an intergenerational trauma that seems to come partly from religion and partly from rigid expectations. Elma is horrified when Heioar’s parents seem like good people, they adopted him and it seems to have been a good fit, but behind this surface is a very different family life and a total rejection of anything or anyone that doesn’t fit their ideals. I wondered how these women like Kristjana and Heioar’s mother were able to look the other way when their men are treating their children badly. Whether through religious conviction or control the fathers have ruled their homes quite literally with a rod of iron. One of the most complex relationships is between Thorgeir and his new girlfriend. I was fascinated with her narratives showing how attraction and repulsion can co-exist between two damaged people. Also, one terrible deed doesn’t define a person. This was a brilliant thriller, exposing a dark underside to Akranes and keeping me guessing to the very end.
Out from Orenda Books on June 20th 2024
Meet the Author
Eva is an Icelandic author of the bestselling Forbidden Iceland series and her books have been published all over the world. Her first book, The Creak on the Stairs, won the Crime Writers Association New Blood dagger, the Blackbird Award and was shortlisted for the Amazon Publishing Awards and the CrimeFest Specsavers Debut Awards.
In the series she writes about my hometown Akranes, a small town just forty minutes outside of Reykjavík with population of around 8000 people. She writes about dysfunctional families and relationships. She has a degree in Sociology and Criminology and is very much interested in human behaviour, which is perhaps evident in the books.
Eva grew up in Akranes and fell in love with reading at the age of 5. She moved to Norway in her twenties to study her Masters Degree and lived there for two years. When she moved back to Iceland she began writing her first novel, as she had always wanted to write a book. She has been a full time writer ever since it was published!
Judy left England as a teenager and is lived with her aunt In New York City. Looking for ways to survive she starts scamming and stealing. Judy’s mother drummed it into her that it was wise for a woman to have her own money and never rely solely on a man. This lesson was well learned, but without any real qualifications or means of making money Judy has to be more creative. She’s a grifter, stealing here and scamming there. So when she sees a story in a newspaper about a rich resident of Cape Cod becoming a widower, she decides on her next mark. Judy finds her way to a vineyard in the same area, taking a job there and making herself known until the inevitable happens and she meets Rory. She plays it clever, doesn’t ask for anything and is never pushy or monopolises his time. She’s playing the long game because she wants him to fall for her, hook line and sinker. What she didn’t bank on was falling in love with him. When they marry she has access to some of the wealthiest people in the area so she’s easily sneaking the odd item from their home and from other society people to sell on through a fence. Every summer they spend in their chateau in France and one summer Rory’s asked to hold the local Wine Appreciation Society ball. Judy is left with a dilemma. Her fence in London is blackmailing her, asking her to provide details of the ball including exits and entrances of the chateau and a guest list of who’s attending. She doesn’t want to help, but when he threatens to tell husband Rory about her past she has no choice. As the burglary takes place, Judy is locked in a toilet cubicle listening to the melee. She’s devastated to hear shots and when she runs to look for Rory she finds herself in the aftermath with a man bleeding out on the floor who turns out to be one of the robbers. When he dies she laments that a young man has died because of her and she can’t shake it off. Years later, it’s in her French home that Judy receives the phone call, the one she’s dreaded and expected all at the same time. The police are looking into a murder, but is the victim the man in France?
When Judy’s daughter Francesca gets a visit from the police and journalists it’s like a bolt from the blue. She’s a lawyer, in London and is aghast when police inform her that her mother seems to have fled the country and is wanted for murder. Francesca is left bewildered and unsure what to do. Yet she knows she must protect her mother, after all her mother has always protected her. This is a smart thriller, that doesn’t fall into cliché territory. The two women’s narratives are layered over each other, with some in the present and others set in the past, taking us from the 1960s in Cape Cod, the 1980s in the South of France and the 2000s in Kensington, London. The author is very adept at giving out just enough information, drip feeding little clues here and there that keep you reading and keep you guessing. Then, suddenly, she wrong foots you with a different direction. I found Judy so fascinating that Francesca suffered a bit in comparison. Not only is Judy beautiful, she’s a smart cookie. She can think on her feet and gets out of the tightest spots, her adrenaline running so high that my heart raced on occasions. She’s the female equivalent of the ruggedly handsome rogue, with a habit of stealing from the rich like a modern day Robin Hood. I love that the author gives her this free-spirited autonomy. She wears a mask at times, but after several years with Rory has relaxed a bit, only for a person from the past to find her. There is only one woman who suspects Judy might not be all she seems and she won’t let go of her suspicions, even taking them to the grave. I loved the allusions to Lady Audley’s Secret a Victorian ‘sensation’ novel based around the fact that Lady Audley is living a lie and may be found out. It’s a book I read at university and I was so shocked by how easy to read it was. It wasn’t slow and ponderous like other Victorian novels, it had pace and excitement just like a contemporary thriller. This is in that same tradition, but Judy has more freedom and status in today’s society. There’s less to lose, thanks to never relying solely on a man, but I was pretty sure that Judy would try her hardest to find a way out anyway. Is it wrong that the thought of her getting away with it made me smile?
Out on 20th June from The Borough Press
Meet the Author
Charlotte worked as a newspaper reporter and editor for years before moving into magazines, and then turning her hand to fiction after having her third baby. As a journalist, her work varied from undercover investigations to celebrity interviews – but what really interests her is seemingly ordinary people who do extraordinary things. This is definitely the springboard for the ideas in her novels, which she hopes are as pacey and entertaining as they are transportive. She’s inspired by favourite books including Apple Tree Yard by Louise Doughty, Restless by William Boyd, Alys, Always by Harriet Lane, The Secret History by Donna Tartt and The Constant Gardener by John Le Carre, but she’s also inspired by (and unashamedly addicted to) compelling TV drama, with favourite series including The Night Manager, True Detective, and The Honourable Woman. After spending time exploring the legacy of her grandfather, the double agent Kim Philby, she became interested in spy fiction and decided to write the books she longed to read: female-led stories that are twisty, stylish and multi-layered, tying together global espionage with haunting domestic noir.
Having only just read her debut The Maiden, I was very keen to get started on this second novel from Kate Foster. This novel is based during the reign of Elizabeth I and James VI of Scotland (James I of England). I knew of James VI’s obsession with witches after studying the Malleus Malificarum at university while writing about disability representation in fiction. I looked at witches while discussing how disfigurement and disability in novels is used as a symbol for evil. The Malleus Maleficarum was the bible for witch finders, describing all the behaviour and characteristics of possible witches and signs to look out for. The book features in this novel as a guide for James VI, who had been alarmed by news of witch hunts in Germany. His proposed bride, Princess Anna of Denmark, set sale for Scotland in 1590 and was driven back by catastrophic storms. The storms were blamed on witches in Denmark and when James travelled to meet her in Norway he heard allegations of witchcraft first hand. Around the same time, in North Berwick, a housemaid called Geillis Duncan was accused of sorcery and when tortured she implicated several other witches, allegedly conspiring with the Earl of Bothwell to take the throne from the King. Kate Foster has taken this history and weaves a story from three women’s points of view, giving a feminist slant on the witch trials that killed thousands over the next two centuries, the majority of them women over forty.
There are three narratives in the book, each one from women who hold different positions in society. Princess Anna of Denmark was a young girl of fourteen when he was betrothed to James VI and attempted to reach Scotland. This has been updated to seventeen in the novel, but at either age there’s an enormous pressure on her shoulders. She has been sent on the basis of a Scottish hand-fasting, if she should please James within the next year he will marry her. If not, she will be ruined for any other marriage and her future looks set to be a life within an abbey. Adding to the pressure, there is a witch burning just before they leave and Anna is compelled to watch, because burnings are a warning to all women. Anna is sickened by what she sees and can’t forget it, convinced as they set sail that the witch is stood on the harbour cursing the voyage and her union with the Scottish king. As it is the sailing does feel cursed because the weather is terrible, sea-sickness is rife and when Anna meets her Scottish tutor Henry every thought of the king is driven from her mind. Anna’s companion and lady-in-waiting is Kristen Sorenson, a pious woman who once lived in Scotland. She is charged with keeping Anna focused on her duty, but she also has her own personal reasons for wanting the royal marriage to be a success. Jura is a housemaid working in the house of the local bailie in North Berwick. Her mother was a cunning woman, treating local women’s ailments with natural ingredients and she passed her knowledge on to Jura. She heals the daughter of the house from a rash and redness on her face using an oatmeal poultice and soon other women in their circle are asking for cures of their own. However, she and the daughter clash over a dalliance with a local farmer’s son and when Baillie Kincaid starts to force his attentions on Jura she decides to flee to Edinburgh. All three women are now caught up in the witchcraft rumours and may have to come together in order to save themselves.
Within a few chapters of the book I felt taken right back to the 16th Century. The witch burning scene in Denmark is see through Anna’s eyes and it is sickening and barbaric to imagine people killed in this way. Before she sees Doritte Olsen burned Anna mentions that even though she is to be betrothed, she doesn’t feel like a woman yet. She doesn’t fully know who she is. She can’t eat and can’t sleep, smelling the smoke on her own hair and knowing that on the beach, Doritte Olsen is still burning down to ash. She starts to see that women have no power in this world and the burning is a lesson – this is what happens if women step outside their role. It left me knowing I was in a different world, where women’s roles are wholly defined by men. Jura senses freedom as she flees to the capital city. Her descriptions of Edinburgh are so vivid as she marvels at houses with four storeys that put the whole street in shadow. She is dazzled by Canongate with it’s gleaming shop fronts, tennis courts and cork-fighting pits. She marvels that her mother never told her such variety existed in one place. The use of Scottish dialect in Jura’s narrative really helps ground the reader in that place and her use of bawdy language made me smile and feel warm towards her.
Here and there, Kate uses letters between the chapters and they had the effect of reminding me that a true story lies behind this novel. After their first night together, she strategically places a letter to the king from his friend Douglas Murray, a fictional character who stands in for a series of lovers the king is known to have had. In a letter that is mainly keeping the king up to date with news from court, he signs off with a curious line:
‘Mostly I await your return […] so that we might embrace each other once more in the manner to which we have become so dearly accustomed’.
The consensus among 21st Century historians is that the king was homosexual or bisexual, but in the context of this story it makes us realise that Anna’s task is a difficult one. She truly will be a wife in duty only and she knows this as she tells Kristen it feels unnatural to be intimate with someone she doesn’t care for in the right way. Her role is to stay quiet and bear children, turning a blind eye to the king’s extra curricular activities. Anna’s description of their intimate relations made me feel sick for her, she senses there is no ‘longing’ in him and I realised that should she become Queen this is her life. She won’t be able to have lovers and her only romance in life would be the way she feels for her tutor Henry. In fact James seems more aroused when torturing potential witches. How I wanted her to run away.
The only women in the novel with a small amount of freedom are those able to earn their own money like Jura and her Aunt Mary who is a healer and cunning woman in Edinburgh. Mary lives alone on what she earns, not in any sort of luxury but at least she has autonomy. The ability to consult a cunning woman is vital for women who might want to stop a pregnancy, boost their fertility or need a charm for love or protection. In this way these autonomous women empower the women around them and accusations of witchcraft subdue not just the woman accused, but every woman in that area. When Jura heals Hazel Kincaid’s facial rash and gets the chance to meet with other local women who gather at the house, she glimpses the chance of a better life:
‘I like healing far better than I like polishing and sweeping and mibbie, one day, soothing grumbling guts and easing flaking skin will help me out of horrible Master Kincaid’s house and away from his prick, and able to rent a dwelling of my own.’
The hypocrisy of the men in the book is infuriating at times. The renowned witch finder Dr Hemmingsen from Copenhagen assures the king that he has a unique way to identify witches, using a bodkin to prick them and find the devil’s mark on their body – the only spot where it won’t hurt. In the same package he has sent the king a golden amulet for protection, carved by a man who knows how to ward off evil. It seems signs and charms are only witchcraft when a man says they are. In fact Anna has never heard so much about the practises of witches as she does from the king, regaling her with tales of baby-killing and orgies with man, woman and beast. Kristen tells Anna that James is becoming a danger to ordinary women and his fervour is a kind of madness, or a licence to abuse and degrade women. Anna has a realisation; a woman’s body is never truly her own, no matter what their position in society. Whether you’re a housemaid whose master decides you’re his property, a witch who can be stripped and examined by men who call themselves god-fearing, or a princess whose family hand-fasted her to James Stuart and didn’t ask her if it was what she wanted. Women must work together if they want to survive. These women are strong, but are they intelligent enough to try and outsmart a king? Kate is brilliant with twists and turns, so I wasn’t surprised to find a few revelations towards the end. I was driven to finish to know what happened to all three women and whether any of them would achieve the freedom they craved. This was a compelling and atmospheric read and cements Kate Foster’s position as a writer of historical fiction at it’s best.
Published on 6th June by Mantle Books
Meet the Author
Kate Foster has been a national newspaper journalist for over twenty years. Growing up in Edinburgh, she became fascinated by its history and often uses it as inspiration for her stories. The Maiden won the Bloody Scotland Pitch Perfect 2020 prize for new writers and is long-listed for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. She lives in Edinburgh with her two children.
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