A stunning, wonderfully assured psychological thriller that evokes Gillian Flynn and Alice Sebold, The Bones of You revolves around a young girl’s murder and one woman’s obsession with uncovering the secrets in an idyllic English village.
I have a gardener’s inherent belief in the natural order of things. Soft‑petalled flowers that go to seed. The resolute passage of the seasons. Swallows … the seasons. Swallows that fly thousands of miles to follow the eternal summer.
Children who don’t die before their parents.
When Kate receives a phone call with news that Rosie Anderson is missing, she’s stunned and disturbed. Rosie is eighteen, the same age as Kate’s daughter, and a beautiful, quiet, and kind young woman. Though the locals are optimistic–girls like Rosie don’t get into real trouble–Kate’s sense of foreboding is confirmed when Rosie is found fatally beaten and stabbed.
Who would kill the perfect daughter, from the perfect family? Yet the more Kate entwines herself with the Andersons–graceful mother Jo, renowned journalist father Neal, watchful younger sister Delphine–the more she is convinced that not everything is as it seems. Anonymous notes arrive, urging Kate to unravel the tangled threads of Rosie’s life and death, though she has no idea where they will lead.
Weaving flashbacks from Rosie’s perspective into a tautly plotted narrative, The Bones of You is a gripping, haunting novel of sacrifices and lies, desperation and love.
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*** Warning this review contains spoilers ***
THE BONES OF YOU by Debbie Howells is a psychological thriller that has been compared to Gone Girl and The Lovely Bones. It is neither. I enjoyed Gone Girl, but I didn’t like The Lovely Bones, which was not a good starting point for this book. However, the blurb looked promising, so I took a punt and was disappointed.
Set in a British village, the story centres on the disappearance and murder of a young girl, Rosie. The shock and horror reverberate through the community, but one woman, Kate, a landscape gardener, is obsessed with finding out whodunit.
Kate is an entitled middle-class annoyance with her perfect marriage, perfect job, and perfect daughter. Any hint of dysfunction in her life is resolved in seconds. She is also dim. The author peppers the book with clues to other people’s dysfunctions; and as these are revealed, Kate reacts in wild-eyed disbelief. Kate’s link with Joanna, Rosie’s mother, is tenuous, to say the least, but she is always popping around unless the plot dictates otherwise. Kate also has a psychic horse (WTF?) and a telepathic connection to Rosie, whose ghost reaches out to us every other chapter.
Rosie was the most interesting character, but the voice from beyond the grave bit didn’t work for me. Sometimes she spoke as a child and other times as the older Rosie looking back. Diary extracts may have been a better plot device for racking up the tension and giving us more insight into her childhood and her parent’s marriage. Learning about Rosie’s life is the best part of this book, even though you will be reduced to tears at times.
I wanted to like this book, but there were too many inconsistencies. This is not a police drama, so no maverick cops running loose, but where were the forensic teams? And the detectives. I am no authority on police procedure, but surely DETECTIVE Sergeant Beauman would have been sent to interview potential witnesses and not plain Sergeant Beauman.
Another gripe: Why didn’t the press descend on the village? Rosie’s dad is a famous TV journalist. Speaking of which, Kate’s old school friend pops up, and she’s also a journalist, wouldn’t you know, here to investigate the murder. Boy, does she have some good contacts, but lucky for us she doesn’t share her discoveries with the police. Only with Kate and only in dribbles of information, presumably in case, Kate’s head exploded at the dark and nasty things being uncovered.
I felt the grand unveiling of the murderer fell flat because the identity of said murderer became obvious all too soon. This can be an exciting device if that endangers the heroine but doesn’t work with one as wet as Kate. This woman wouldn’t realise she was in danger even if God himself came down and told her.
At the very end of the book, Kate takes in Delphine, Rosie’s 12-year-old sister. Which I’m sure wasn’t a problem for social services, Delphine’s aunt or Kate’s perfect husband. Gimme a break.
Very unpredictable! I loved it.
good book
In the beginning, I thought it was going to really hold my interest as it was a good plot. However, toward the middle I realized the characters were repeating the same dialogue over and over and I became bored, especially as I had already guessed who the villain was.
This book had me guessing till the end. I knew the murderer wasn’t who the book wanted you to believe it was, but I was surprised to find out who it was. Loved Kate, the main character. Also, loved the writer’s style and how she made you feel the emotions of the characters. Very good book.
I enjoyed the descriptive writing, interesting characters, how family dynamics affect members and others around them throughout their lives.
I felt that I had read this book before. It is very similar to The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold.