Annie —
The Wych Elm by Tana French
I heard about this novel on one of my favourite podcasts, A Good Read BBC with Harriet Gilbert. Tana French is a new author to me, but I will certainly be picking up another of her books after I was kept in absolute suspense by The Wych Elm.
The story follows Toby, an everyday Irish bloke in his late twenties, who has led a blessedly uneventful existence until, during a burglary at his flat, he is beaten to within an inch of his life. While recovering both physically and mentally from the attack, he moves in with his ailing uncle at the family property, the Ivy House, where Toby and his cousins Susanna and Leon spent many happy summers growing up. However, when a skull turns up in the ancient wych elm at the bottom of the garden, Toby is forced to reassess that idyllic childhood and try to discover what sinister secrets have been buried at the Ivy House.
With the atmospheric tone and pacing of The Secret History or If We Were Villains, this is a high-end literary mystery that explores how we craft our sense of self and what happens when that essence is shaken by external events. A slow burn, but certainly one that paid off in my eyes.
Juice by Tim Winton
Thanks to our partnership with Libro.fm I was able to listen to the new Tim Winton novel, narrated by David Field. I found it an incredibly immersive experience: the combination of Winton’s electric prose and Field’s gritty voice were absolutely compelling.
We open on our unknown protagonist fleeing across a landscape ravaged by the effects of climate change, trying to protect himself and the silent young girl who is his companion. When they reach an abandoned mine site, they think they may have found somewhere to hole up for a while – but they are not alone. Taken prisoner by the embittered ‘bowman’, our narrator takes a leaf (or several) out of Scheherazade’s book and begins to tell the tale of his life, attempting to reach the humanity within their captor. Over the course of this long night, we learn how society has come to the state in which it finds itself, and what the storyteller has done in service of a better world.
As I was reading this, I was reminded of both Mad Max and Lee Child, although written with the virtuosic styling that Winton is renowned for. It is different to anything of his I have read before, and it seems to be Winton’s greatest project yet, bringing together his deep love of country and character to reveal one possibility for our future if we continue on our current trajectory.
Abbey —
Shadows of Winter Robins by Louise Wolhuter
Louise Wolhuter’s coming-of-age mystery, Shadows of Winter Robins, blends intrigue, kitchen-sink drama, landscape, family trauma and horror through atmospheric, and at times, tender, prose.
Winter Robins and her brother live with their affectionate mother and talented, musical father in Northern England, until a loss places them in the care of their kind but no longer capable grandmother. One winter, an uncle arrives and brings the siblings to live in Australia with family who have only ever been alluded to previously.
Winter settles into the rhythm of living at Langomar, their new beachside home, forming relationships with a cast of new family members, learning to swim, and avoiding their grandfather, an artist of some renown. All is not well. Wolhuter expertly carries her readers on a journey back and forth through time and place. In the present, Winter is being interviewed in relation to a serious incident, and she believes that something terrible happened at Langomar. Every question, and every answer, throws readers in a new direction, and results in a new chilling revelation.