Summary: In this deeply suspenseful and irresistibly unnerving debut novel, a man and his girlfriend are on their way to a secluded farm. When the two take an unexpected detour, she is left stranded in a deserted high school, wondering if there is any escape at all. (Goodreads)
Warnings: Creepiness, stalker behavior, and …it’s a thriller, there may be upsetting things.
Review:
The main premise, not exactly the plot, is a simple one with this book: A girl is thinking about ending things with her boyfriend. However, there are so many creeptastic things that happen even among the first couple of pages. The narrator recounts a time when she was laying down and looks over to see someone standing by her window. In this scene, I got the heeby jeebies. Iain Reid managed to paint one of my nightmare scenarios with pinpoint precision. It was such a well crafted part.
He does this time and time again throughout the novel.
Iain Reid does such a fabulous job setting scene and managing to do details in first person that doesn’t sound forced. The narrator’s unease is almost tangible. I was scared for her throughout most of the novel and some parts of it took me a while to realize why. The pace was well balanced. Characterization was done well even with characters that made a minimal appearance. I was surprised by this since the book isn’t very long. It’s under 300 pages. The author does such a good job of evoking emotion in a short amount of time.
While I’m not going to spoil the ending, it was the reason I didn’t give this novel 5 stars. I’m not sure if this is typical of thrillers but the end lacked a bit of clarity I wished it had. I think I have most of the pieces and perhaps with a second read through, I’ll manage to have a better picture but I do wish there wasn’t such vagueness in the last pages.
Overall, I enjoyed this muchly and will be checking out this author’s other works.
Rating: 4/5
May you get lost in a book,
Chrissy