Published By: Sphere
Pages: 432
Released On: 16/07/2024
Out here, it’s easy to get lost…
After the dark events that scarred her childhood, Kier Templer escaped her hometown and twin to live her life on the road. They’ve never lost contact until, on a trip to a Portuguese national park, Kier vanishes without a trace.
Detective Elin Warner arrives in the same park ready to immerse herself in its vast wilderness – only to hear about Kier’s disappearance, and discover a disturbing map she left behind. The few strangers at the isolated camp close ranks against her questions, and the park’s wild beauty starts to turn sinister.
Elin must untangle the clues to find out what really happened to Kier. But when you follow a trail, you have to be careful to watch your back…
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Sphere for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
This was the complete opposite to the book I read prior to it but it was very much a welcome change.
I absolutely loved Sarah’s previous books in this series – The Sanatorium and The Retreat – and I know I will jump on the chance to read any book she writes.
I have just found out that this is the final book in the Elin Warner series and I am very sad about that. I’m sure anything Sarah writes, I will absolutely loved, but I have really enjoyed this trilogy and seeing the directions she’s taken it.
It opens with a description of an unnamed individual in a campervan of sorts in the dead of the night. I’ve always liked the idea of a campervan but I’ve thought it’d be too claustrophobic, and Sarah has depicted that fear absolutely perfectly. I was only two pages in and my heart was already in my throat. It’s not over the top, but really tells you the direction this book is going in.
It’s split between two characters, two time periods, and two locations: we have Kier in Devon in 2018, and Elin in Portugual in 2021. Kier’s scenes are in first person, and Elin’s in third person. In Kier’s sections we also meet Zeph, her partner, and in Elin’s we have her brother Isaac.
I particularly liked Elin’s scenes with her brother as it allows us to see her relationship with him and how different that makes her than when she’s in a professional capacity. By having the two separate scenes, it’s like we have two stories and two sets of protagonists, and Sarah has expertly managed to weave them together.
What I enjoy about this series is that Elin isn’t…how do I put this? She’s not an active policewoman on policewoman duties. She always seems to be in a place where a crime happens to occur, and I like that. It means we get to see her as a character for herself, as Elin Warner, before we see her as a police officer, which gives us an extra depth to her.
There are some difficult topics raised, such as coercive control, emotional abuse, toxicity, death, crime, injury, grief, bereavement, loneliness, relationship difficulties, paranoia etc.
This felt very different to the first two. Whereas those were very enclosed, set in one place – unsurprisingly, the sanatorium and the retreat respectively – this felt wider. Yes it is all in one setting I suppose, but they can go anywhere. Mountains and hills and rivers and camps and villages etc. It’s more open and I cannot decide it that makes it more or less frightening. It’s less claustrophobic, but it invites in more danger.
There are twists and turns all over the shop which is exactly what I’ve come to expect from her work. You think the only thing linking them is the location but there’s more to it than that, and there was definitely one twist I didn’t see coming, about halfway through. It was a proper hand to mouth gasp kind of thing.
It is as engrossing and chilling as I’ve come to expect from her books, but it’s more subtle. There’s no murder mystery, no trail of bodies, no obvious violence etc, but there’s this subtle, quiet chill that, for me anyway, makes it more thrilling.
Books By Your Bedside 