Books about spooky old houses are definitely my 'thing' and The Forgotten Room didn't disappoint! Maura Lyle is a nurse returning to work after her life went spectacularly off the rails. (The reason why is dripped slowly through the story). Her first job is as a live-in carer to the elderly Gordon Henderson, who owns a crumbling gothic mansion called Essen Grange. The surrounding land has been sold for housing development and Maura has hardly moved in when the first dead body is discovered in what used to be the garden.
I loved this book because of the setting - spooky old house, yay! - and the cast of eccentric but not remotely lovable characters who could have come straight out of a Dickens novel. I loved the heroine for the pragmatic way she dealt with all the horrible things life threw at her. I wasn't so keen on all the mentions of bodily fluids, but that's because I'm a squeamish kind of person. If you're a squeamish kind of person too, I'd better mention that there is a very short but gruesome paragraph about two thirds of the way through the book, when one of the characters comes to a sticky end.
It did get a little confusing trying to untangle the various family relationships and I didn't quite buy the final twist - although I thought it was very clever. This was one of those books where I smugly decided I knew how the story was going to pan out, only to have the denouement knock me sideways. It didn't tie everything up neatly either, another thing I liked. And that 'forgotten room'? Chilling...
For me this was a 4.5, rounded up to a 5, and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes gripping murder mysteries with a slightly gothic twist. Although cosy crime fans had better turn right around and start running...
Thank you to Ann Troup, HQ Digital, and Netgalley for my copy of this book, which I received in exchange for an honest review.
No comments:
Post a Comment