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HOUSE OF THE LOST
by Sarah Rayne
Pocket, August 2010
407 pages
6.99 GBP
ISBN: 1847393578


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Published author Theo Kendal is spending the winter at Fenn House in the Norfolk village of Melbray where he spent his childhood holidays with his extended family, and where his beloved cousin Charmery has recently been murdered. She bequeathed him the secluded riverside cottage and with her killer still on the loose he returns there hoping to find out more about why she died.

He's also hoping to finish his new book in the peace and quiet of the country. But as he sits down to write, he finds himself inexplicably channelling the story of a young boy, Matthew Valk; a child growing up in Romania during the brutal Ceauşescu dictatorship.

While Matthew's story unfolds on his laptop, his own story is getting more complex. His cousin's killer may be trying to kill him. Her ghost may be haunting him. And when he befriends the nuns at a nearby convent, he starts to realise that not only are the characters he's writing about real, they are somehow connected not only to Melbray but to his family.

At the start of the book there are a couple of hurdles for the reader to get over. The young Matthew's 'voice' comes across rather patronisingly like an adult talking down to a child, and there is an early awkwardness during the introduction of how Matthew's story is coming to Theo which requires a certain suspension of belief. But and all this soon settles into a well spun and expertly researched narrative which switches neatly between the frightening events of present-day Norfolk, Theo's own unsettling childhood memories and the horror of the last twenty years of Ceauseşcu's reign.

The intricate web of connections between the past and present are very well handled and the plot flows without a stumble. The only unbelievable aspects of the novel are the misplaced romances that spring up in the present which feel like an afterthought and a superfluous attempt to lighten the mood of what is a dark but powerful and moving story.

Madeleine Marsh is an aspiring writer who lives in the South West. She helps run sci-fi conventions and loves modern cinema.

Reviewed by Madeleine Marsh, August 2010

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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