Where the hell do I start in reviewing this? What a plot! The press release suggested it was Gone Girl meets Room and I thought, yeah, right, in your dreams. But it damn well IS! I read it in a day. I should have been doing other things but I’m sorry, I could not put it down until I found out what the heck was going on. But a book like this presents such a challenge for a reviewer because the worst, the very worst thing anyone could do is divulge anything that happens in this story.
Let me start, though by offering you the blurb:-
‘A windowless shack in the woods. Lena’s life and that of her two children follows the rules set by their captor, the father: merles, bathroom visits, study time are strictly scheduled and meticulously observed. He protects his family from the dangers lurking in then outside world and makes sure that his children will always have a mother to look after them.
One day Lena manages to flee - but the nightmare continues. It seems as if her tormentor wants to get back what belongs to him. And then there is the question whether she really is the woman called ‘Lena’ who disappeared whiteout a trace over thirteen years ago. The police and Lena’s family are all desperately trying to piece together a puzzle which doesn't quite seem to fit.’
This is a best seller in Germany and I’m pretty sure it will be here too. It’s one of those thrillers that you can’t second guess even when the details are fed to you slowly, like a drip feed, as the novel progresses. The facts turn around in your head, pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, but they never quite fit until the final denouement when all is revealed and you’re left hollowly clutching at the words in disbelief almost as the full import hits you.
Romy Hausmann seems to have defied convention in the writing of this book, I can’t think of another suitable way to describe it. It isn’t formulaic as so many psychological thrillers are. They are no less enjoyable because of that but this almost maverick approach is what will possibly set this book apart from others of its genre.
The complexity of its themes; the psychology of trauma in both children and adults is heart wrenching on both counts. The nature of both paternal and maternal love is chillingly explored on several levels. But above all it’s a story of survival, raw and uncompromising and again on more than one level. It’s extraordinary. There is a precision to the writing; descriptions and details. Palpable. Believable. There is an understanding of the flawed human, an idealistic parent and the innocent, trusting child. There is an acknowledgement of the dark, base nature that can reside in the seemingly unlikeliest of individuals. And the police, desperate, clutching, thwarted. The media, desperate, clutching, thwarted. If this was on the Great British Bake Off it would be a showstopper and Ms. Hausmann would be Star Baker. It's that unusual thing - a thriller that actually makes you think AFTER you've finished reading it.
Lovers of psycho thrillers will see the parallels with Emma Donoghue's Room and Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl but hopefully they will also see how this writer seems to have taken one giant step further in the development of the genre.
My thanks to Katya Ellis at Quercus Books who sent me a copy and to Ella Patel who invited me to the Social Media Blast. Checkout what other bloggers have to say about this story. And stay tuned to my blog for I have an interview with the author, Romy Hausmann, coming up!
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