It’s midsummer and the annual writing workshops are about to begin at the sprawling Devon home of novelist Eleanor Lambe. A group of old friends arrive to act as tutors, bringing past rivalries and resentments with them. They include Eleanor’s former lover, the charismatic poet Frank Marwell, and his new fiancée. The same night, Eleanor falls from her clifftop garden and lies in hospital, … hospital, damaged, silent. Gossip says she jumped; the police rule out foul play. Her niece, Jo, sits at her bedside, waiting. Messy, complicated relationships mean tensions run high, made worse when Jo starts asking awkward questions.
But what really happened that night? And will Eleanor ever remember?
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This was a book which I was always eager to pick up to read the next bit. The mystery – did best-selling novelist Eleanor fall, did she jump or was she pushed? – smoulders in the background of this Devon set novel, its intensity increasing as the story unfolds.
The main protagonist, Eleanor’s niece Jo, is suspicious that something about the accident doesn’t add up. Her aunt (who brought her up after her mother’s death) suffered a head trauma and remembers nothing of the incident so it’s left to Jo to assess each of the cast of potential perpetrators – a group of old writer friends of Eleanor’s who have assembled to run a series of workshops.
Suspicion floats around all of them in some way or other, along with Eleanor’s tetchy personal assistant. Clearly, something in their shared past is at play here but Jo has no idea what.
The introduction of the local café owner and his teenage son add an extra dimension to the storyline and contribute to the developing plot.
An interesting set of characters, diverse and well drawn. Great story. A most enjoyable read.
Atmospheric and gripping. Excellent.
Quite simply, I am a fan of this writer.
She has a signature style, a particular ability to create PLACE and time and atmosphere and setting in ways that are so rich, so specific and detailed, that wherever she invites us to follow her tales, we are there, fully immersed.
With each of her always intriguing novels, she creates completely unique circumstances in very defined arenas: the art world, the music world, wine-making—and clearly has such insight, and has done such thorough research, that we not only get to enjoy a page-turning story, but also get an authentic glimpse into the arcane protocols and nuances of those realms.
In The Silence Before the Thunder, she takes us into a sphere she clearly knows well: the literary world, one of a successful author who’s established a retreat environment for herself and other writers, where, annually, there is workshop conference where writers and fans of writers alike gather to hear lectures, partake of tutorial sessions, and join symposiums. In this rustic locale of forested land high above a rocky shoreline, novelist Eleanor Lamb lives and works, yet just as the time approaches for this touted event, she suddenly goes missing. When it’s discovered that she tumbled off the cliffs above that rocky shoreline, left injured and without memory, it’s thought that she simply fell, grown weaker with age and potentially less alert and aware. But was that the case?
Into the picture enters a cast of characters who bring their own histories, relationships, concerns and conceits, and as we learn more about each—particularly a longtime former lover of Eleanor’s, Frank, and his new fiancée—we are left to wonder if there is something more nefarious going on. Swooping in to aid the aunt who helped raise her and from whom she’s been somewhat estranged, is Jo, a writer herself, who steps in to both manage her aunt’s care and facilitate the fruition of the event.
As Jo begins to get the lay of the land, however, she’s struck by the many facts and clues that make the original story of Eleanor’s fall dubious. She meets a young man down below the cliffs who claims to have heard an argument prior to the accident, eluding to the fact that it was someone who, perhaps, wanted to do Eleanor harm. It’s information that sends the entire group into a cacophony of anxiety, suspicion, and wariness.
Much like the framework of every page-turning, nail-biting Agatha Christie novel, The Silence Before the Thunder conjures an inclusive, almost claustrophobic scenario in which the characters are forced to gather and interact with each other, each with their own reasons for suspicion, each with their own issues with Eleanor. With a musical-chairs effect that has us swirling between clever red herrings, and the moving in and out of conviction that, “THAT’S the culprit!”, we are drawn into the gathering storm of fear, violence, and fractured relationships to ultimately be led to the final revelation.
A wonderful read, which, like every good mystery, keeps us precariously on the edge from beginning to end.