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Summary
Summary
An exhilarating debut novel that follows one woman's hunt for the truth when she realizes she might have married a killer
They said her death was a tragic accident. And I believed them...until now.
Carmen is happily married to Tom, although she knows she'll always live in the shadow of another woman--the mistress who ended his first marriage: Zena. Mercurial, mesmerizing, manipulative Zena--a woman who, Carmen begins to discover, had the potential to incite the darkest of emotions. Zena, who drowned in the sea late one night.
Zena seems ever-more present, even in death, and when Carmen unknowingly stumbles on evidence that her husband has not been telling her the whole truth, she can't shake her unease. As she uncovers documents and photographs, a very different tale than the one Tom has led her to believe begins to unfold, and she finds herself increasingly isolated and paranoid. As the twisted events of that night begin to come to light, Carmen must ask herself if it's really a truth worth knowing...even if it destroys her and the lives of the people she loves most.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Echoes of Daphne du Maurier's classic Rebecca reverberate throughout British author Heathcote's impressive debut. Londoners Carmen and Tom Cawton, who have been happily married for two years, talk about having a child while weathering the challenges of frequent weekend visits with Tom's three children from his first marriage to Laura. Those visits usually occur at their second home, a beach bungalow in the Norfolk village of St. Jude's that Tom once co-owned with his one-time mistress, Zena Johnson. Three years earlier, Zena disappeared after going for a swim. Days later her body washed up a mile from the bungalow. St. Jude's is a gossipy place, and Carmen hears a rumor that some people think Tom murdered Zena. Carmen's curiosity about Zena turns into an obsession. She snoops through Tom's possessions and relentlessly compares herself to the charismatic Zena with her film-star looks, causing friction in her marriage. The intense psychological thriller is strengthened by an evocative isolated setting that seems ruled by Zena's ghost. Agent: Alexandra Machinist, ICM. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Guardian Review
Darktown, by Thomas Mullen (Little, Brown, [pound]16.99) is set in Atlanta, Georgia, which, in 1948, is a place where black lives don't matter -- at least, not to the white authorities. The police force has, however, just hired its first black officers. Tasked with policing the "coloured" neighbourhoods, the eight men find themselves in the impossible position of upholding the law while still being, in the segregated "Jim Crow" south of the US, second-class citizens. Issued with guns and badges, they have no squad car and are forbidden to arrest white suspects. They face constant taunts and racial abuse as well as suspicion from their own community and, denied access to the police stations, the men are forced to operate out of a dingy basement. When a black woman, last seen in a car with a drunken white man, is murdered, the powers that be are indifferent, and it is left to officers Boggs and Smith, with help from sympathetic white cop Rakestraw, to try and find the culprit. Fascinating, grim and unsettling, this is a story of violent and ingrained racism, political corruption, conspiracy and almost unbearable psychological pressure. Tall Oaks (twenty7, [pound]7.99), the first novel from Chris Whitaker, set in a fictitious American small town in California, is a pleasingly unusual mixture of psychological thriller and screwball comedy from a young writer who is clearly not afraid to take risks. When three-year-old Harry goes missing, everyone wants to help, but when he doesn't turn up, mother Jess finds herself in a destructive spiral of booze and promiscuity, despite support from the local chief of police and the community. The supporting cast includes Manny, a podgy, potty-mouthed teenager who wants to be a gangster and who swelters in his woollen three-piece suit and too-tight fedora as he tries to extort money from local shopkeepers, and Jerry, the mountainous, slow-witted manager of a local photo store. They are an absolute delight. That this highly original mashup doesn't entirely come off is, I think, mainly due to Whitaker's lack of writing experience -- subtler characterisation is required for the denouement to be entirely convincing -- but the combination of verve, humour and pathos make it well worth a read. The Child Garden (Constable, [pound]7.99) is a contemporary standalone novel from Catriona McPherson, author of the Dandy Gilver series. The life of bookish council registrar Gloria Harkness revolves around work and visiting a care home to read to her comatose 15-year-old son, who suffers from a neurodegenerative condition, and to chat to her elderly landlady. Thirty years earlier, the building housed a school of the progressive, hippy-dippy variety called Eden, which was closed after one of its pupils drowned in mysterious circumstances. The re-appearance of a former Eden pupil, Gloria's old friend Stephen, and the discovery of the corpse of another ex-student in the now-overgrown grounds lead to a police investigation in which Stephen becomes the primary suspect. Gloria, making her own inquiries, finds that a number of those present on the night of the original tragedy have either killed themselves or had remarkably bad luck in life... Set in rural Scotland, The Child Garden is both utterly intriguing and disturbingly eerie. Told from multiple points of view, The Silence Between Breaths by Cath Staincliffe (Constable, [pound]19.99) is a tale of strangers on a train -- in this case, the 10.35am from Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston. The hopes, fears and concerns of the passengers are various: a job interview, a holiday, difficulties at work, stroppy children, a parent with dementia ... And in the middle of the travellers sits Saheel, a man on a mission, armed with a lethal rucksack. The story begins with the mundane and ends with the horrific. It's fairly clear what's going to happen from the off, but Staincliffe is a sensitive and humane writer whose talent for characterisation is such that our investment in Naz, Holly, Jeff and the rest of the potentially doomed passengers is the fuel for real suspense. Undertow, a psychological thriller with a nod to Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, is the debut novel from Elizabeth Heathcote (Quercus, [pound]12.99). Journalist Carmen, second wife to lawyer Tom and stepmother to his three children, feels uncomfortable around first wife Laura, even though she was not the cause of the break-up and Laura is unfailingly polite. However, this is as nothing compared to Carmen's discomfiture over Zena, the glamorous woman for whom Tom left Laura, and who subsequently drowned off the Norfolk coast. When chance remarks lead Carmen to suspect that Zena's death was not, after all, an accident, she starts to investigate, and begins to worry that Tom might have been responsible. A strong sense of place, deft plotting and moments of genuine surprise make up for a lack of emotional depth and some unconvincingly summarised scenes. - Laura Wilson.
Booklist Review
Hearing that your husband's previous girlfriend died under mysterious circumstances is never easy. Add to that your husband's violent mood swings and the fact that he never told you he was held for questioning in the girlfriend's death, and, naturally, you're going to start getting suspicious. With her husband discouraging her from going back to work, former journalist Carmen has lots of time on her hands to find out what really happened to Zena, the beautiful woman who broke up Tom's first marriage. Throw into the mix a secret bank account and some troubling behavior by Tom's kids, and Carmen has every right to be concerned for her own safety. The setting, a small English village where the London couple maintain their second home, is evoked with just the right mix of rural appeal and lurking danger to make Carmen's isolation and insecurity seem credible. This fine piece of psychological suspense was originally published in the UK but is little known here and deserves to find a new audience.--Keefe, Karen Copyright 2017 Booklist
Library Journal Review
DEBUT Carmen has been happily married to Tom for two years. She met him soon after Zena, for whom he left his first wife, drowned near their beach home. Zena's tragic demise and Tom's affair with her, were a part of his past that Carmen had accepted. But while visiting their beach house, she overhears a rumor that leads her to believe that maybe Tom hasn't been completely honest with her about Zena's death. Carmen begins to dig into the fatal drowning and uncovers evidence that tells a very different story. But why would Tom lie? Carmen must decide if confronting Tom about his past is worth the toll it will take on her life. With gothic hints of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, Heathcote's first novel features a fast-paced, twisty plot. Much of the suspense is built through key players' inability to remember past events. While some of the relationships seem a bit stilted at times, the resolution will leave readers shocked and satisfied. VERDICT Recommended for fans of Gillian Flynn.-Kristen Calvert Nelson, Marion Cty. P.L. Syst., Ocala, FL © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.