Publishers Weekly
01/27/2020
In Melmoth author Perry’s eerie, peculiar latest (first published in the U.K. in 2014), an anxious London bookshop owner assumes a new identity among a set of mentally disturbed strangers. After feeling oppressed by the summer heat, John Cole closes up the shop and decides to visit his brother in Norfolk. On the way, John gets lost and suffers a panic attack, his car breaks down, and then, following a path through the forest, he discovers a house full of people who claim they have been awaiting his arrival. Initially unable to admit he’s not the “Jon Coules” they’d been expecting, he finds himself captivated by the group of old friends— particularly Eve and Alex, both in their 20s—who know each other from their past stays at St. Jude’s psychiatric ward. Hester, the mischievous, much older ringleader, vows to help the others improve themselves, while Alex, alarmed by anonymous letters he’s received about a nearby dam, takes dangerous nightly swims to check for signs of impending floods. Over the week spent at the house, John’s lust for Eve grows and he settles into his borrowed identity as Coules, and Perry teases out questions of sanity, love, and faith. Though the slow pace will test readers’ patience, the novel succeeds in building a strange world in the English woods. Perry’s fans will want to take a look. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House. (Mar.)
From the Publisher
"Like Shirley Jackson, Carmen Maria Machado, and other evocative masters of the gothic, Perry circles closer to answers without ever dispelling the magic that holds her narrative in breathless suspense. A mysterious fable about honesty and deceit, love and self-loathing, and our sometimes-doomed quests for inner peace." — Kirkus Reviews
“A beautiful, dream-like, unsettling narrative in which every word, like a small jewel, feels carefully chosen, considered and placed. Rarely do debut novels come as assured and impressive as this one.” — Sarah Waters
“A dark, marvelous novel…pour yourself a cool drink and bask in a dazzling new writing talent.” — Daily Telegraph
“Deeply creepy and startlingly well-written.” — Times Literary Supplement
“Inexplicably gripping from the first page …a hypnotic performance with an understated, dreamlike conviction.” — Sunday Times
"Impressive....Casts a spell that is at once sinister and seductive...We search for our own meaning while succumbing to Perry's elegant prose and dark magic." — Minneapolis Star Tribune
“A taut summer thriller.” — Harper’s Bazaar
“Will haunt the reader long after the final page.” — Guardian
“An original and haunting book…a mix of elegant, alluring, but subtly sinister characters…a talented writer.” — Daily Mail (UK)
“Perry’s work harnesses the mythic power of religious and historical texts to lend weight and wonderment…she is adept at peeling back the skin to reveal a detailed anatomy of psychological motivation…A gripping, memorable, impressive debut.” — Independent on Sunday (UK)
"Atmospheric, haunting, disturbing." — Wall Street Journal
Sarah Waters
A beautiful, dream-like, unsettling narrative in which every word, like a small jewel, feels carefully chosen, considered and placed. Rarely do debut novels come as assured and impressive as this one.
Guardian
Will haunt the reader long after the final page.
Harper’s Bazaar
A taut summer thriller.
Daily Mail (UK)
An original and haunting book…a mix of elegant, alluring, but subtly sinister characters…a talented writer.”
Times Literary Supplement
Deeply creepy and startlingly well-written.
Sunday Times
Inexplicably gripping from the first page …a hypnotic performance with an understated, dreamlike conviction.
Independent on Sunday (UK)
Perry’s work harnesses the mythic power of religious and historical texts to lend weight and wonderment…she is adept at peeling back the skin to reveal a detailed anatomy of psychological motivation…A gripping, memorable, impressive debut.”
Daily Telegraph
A dark, marvelous novel…pour yourself a cool drink and bask in a dazzling new writing talent.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
"Impressive....Casts a spell that is at once sinister and seductive...We search for our own meaning while succumbing to Perry's elegant prose and dark magic."
Wall Street Journal
"Atmospheric, haunting, disturbing."
Wall Street Journal
"Atmospheric, haunting, disturbing."
Sunday Times
Inexplicably gripping from the first page …a hypnotic performance with an understated, dreamlike conviction.
Daily Telegraph
A dark, marvelous novel…pour yourself a cool drink and bask in a dazzling new writing talent.
Times Literary Supplement
Deeply creepy and startlingly well-written.
Harper’s Bazaar
A taut summer thriller.
Guardian
Will haunt the reader long after the final page.
Kirkus Reviews
2019-12-23
In this eerie debut novel from Perry (Melmoth, 2018, etc.), now published in the U.S. for the first time, a man becomes lost in the woods only to be welcomed by a household of strange but passionate residents.
Tired of the summer heat, John Cole sets off from his London bookshop to visit his brother, who lives by the sea. But John never arrives. In the dark Thetford forest, his car breaks down, and he loses his way in the woods. At the end of a path, he reaches the door of a grand mansion. The young girl who opens it seems to recognize him. "John Cole! Is that you? It is you, isn't it—it must be, I'm so glad. I've been waiting for you all day!" So begins Perry's unsettling debut, which shuttles between fairy story and allegory without ever resolving into a single shape or genre. The house is both magnificent and menacing, with "broken chandeliers trailing chipped strings of glass drops," a glass eye constantly changing hands, and empty meat hooks dangling in the kitchen. Consumed with dread and guilt about being an imposter, John chronicles his days with the residents in a journal that reads like a fever dream. There's Hester, a fiercely protective matron and former actress; Elijah, a former preacher who has lost his faith and fears going outside; Walker, a chain-smoking, card-playing devil in a rumpled tuxedo; Eve, a coquettish pianist who longs for attention; and the siblings Clare and Alex, otherworldly changelings who seem at once capable of complete innocence and total guile. Unlike Perry's following two novels, plot matters less than mood here—confusion, uncertainty, and endless possibility unfold over the week of John's stay. Even the sundial in the garden tells "two times at once." What connects this fragile household together? Who is sending Alex cruel poison-pen letters? Why does Eve make John feel "pain set up very low in his stomach…as if hooks had been pushed through his flesh"? And whose place has John actually taken? Like Shirley Jackson, Carmen Maria Machado, and other evocative masters of the gothic, Perry circles closer to answers without ever dispelling the magic that holds her narrative in breathless suspense.
A mysterious fable about honesty and deceit, love and self-loathing, and our sometimes-doomed quests for inner peace.
