Blood Orange

Uncomfortable, dark, & addictive reading, crammed with complex, messed-up characters. It holds a mirror up to life, but a house of horrors mirror, where nothing in the reflection is as it seems. A must read.

Allison is a young lawyer who, by all outward appearances, is leading a happy life. But she drinks too much. She has landed her first murder trial, defending a woman accused of stabbing her husband to death when he was passed out drunk, but is having a tumultuous affair with Patrick, her supervising attorney. Her husband, Carl, a therapist who specializes in sex addiction, is at his wits’ end and not mincing words about it. He increasingly expresses dismay about Allison’s ability and desire to parent their six-year-old daughter, Mathilda.

As the story opens, Allison attempts to break off her extramarital relationship with Patrick. She’s out with him and group of colleagues, drinks too much, and they end up in her office where she later passes out. Carl and Mathilda arrive the next morning and find her disheveled, still asleep in a chair. Lunch with friends only makes things worse. Allison drinks too much yet again and insists upon karaoke — but she’s the only one participating and her performance is humiliating.

Madeleine, Allison’s new client, insists that she did, in fact, murder her husband as he slept and is determined to plead guilty. But Allison advises her to plead not guilty and wait until the prosecution turns over its evidence. Allison suspects that there is a reason for Madeleine’s insistence that she is not revealing to her counsel.

When Allison begins receiving threatening anonymous text messages, she becomes frightened and concerned about who might be aware of her affair with Patrick, an unrepentant ladies’ man.

Harriet Tyce’s debut psychological thriller is a character study populated with intriguing, darkly disturbed characters and surprising twists. At the heart of the story is Allison, who has lost confidence in herself and her ability to manage her life. Although she and Carl were happy once, they have grown increasingly distant over the course of the past two years, and that distance propelled Allison into an affair with the attractive but dangerous Patrick. Both Carl and Patrick are abusive in their own right. Carl constantly criticizes Allison for her shortcomings as a wife and mother, complaining about the hours she works even though she is the primary breadwinner and Carl works only part time. Patrick manipulates Allison for his own satisfaction, insulting and ignoring her with the knowledge that when he wants to have rough sex with her she will make herself available because she is lonely and seeking comfort. Allison is determined to get her drinking under control and dismayed when she is seemingly unable to do so, even though she feels confident that she has not consumed alcohol to the point of blacking out. And as all of these various complications exist in her life, Allison is tasked with defending a woman who claims that her dead husband was horrifically abusive him to her, as well as their 14-year-old son.

Tyce keepers readers in suspense, relating the events that happen in Allison’s life at a steady pace until one day the unthinkable happens. Mathilda is in danger and Carl blames Allison. From that point, the action speeds up considerably and, as Allison’s live begins fully unraveling, Tyce reveals what has actually been transpiring. The result is an intricately plotted, deftly executed story about a woman whose life seems to be out of control as a result of her own actions when, in reality, there is much more to the story. And machinations by those around her, some of which are quite sordid and shocking.

Ultimately, Blood Orange is a reminder that it is never possible to fully know another human being, particularly in the 21st century when technology makes keeping secrets a dicey proposition. It is an exploration of the kind of treatment of women and behavior by men that woman all-too-often accept as normal, blaming themselves for not being nurturing enough, chastising themselves for finding it challenging to successfully balance home and family, and internalizing problems rather than recognizing that the responsibility for child-rearing and maintaining a relationship should be mutual. It is a story about how one woman, depressed and lacking self-esteem, allows herself to be manipulated and abused. It is also a story about surviving abuse, deception, and betrayal, and becoming empowered.

Blood Orange is a disturbing, insightful, and compelling story. and an impressive debut novel.

Thanks to NetGalley for an Advanced Reader’s Copy of the book.

A dark and disturbing domestic noir.