From the book blurb:From the bestselling, multiple prize-shortlisted novelist Catherine Ryan Howard comes an explosive story about a twisted voyeur and a terrible crime... PLAY Andrew, the manager of Shanamore Holiday Cottages, watches his only guest via a hidden camera in her room. One night the unthinkable happens: a shadowy figure emerges onscreen, kills her and destroys the camera. But who is the murderer? How did they know about the camera? And how will Andrew live with himself? PAUSE Natalie wishes she'd stayed at home as soon as she arrives in the wintry isolation of Shanamore. There's something creepy about the manager. She wants to leave, but she can't - not until she's found what she's looking for... REWIND This is an explosive story about a murder caught on camera. You've already missed the start. To get the full picture you must rewind the tape and play it through to the end, no matter how shocking... My thoughts: Natalie O'Connor-Kerr, a lifestyle blogger and a rising Instagram star, a woman with a dream job, dream house in an expensive area of Dublin, and a dream husband, takes a bus to the middle of nowhere, a half-deserted village of Shanamore on the coast. She has a reservation for one of the cottages supervised by a young man Andrew, who immediately gives her if not creeps, at least a strange vibe. Once in her cottage Natalie starts looking through the drawers until she finds a poetry book with a blue cover and an expensive bookplate. You see inside the book there is a dedication 'For my M' in Natalie's handwriting. Natalie has never been to Shanamore and her husband Mike denies ever setting his foot in the place, so how would you explain an entry on Mike's credit card bill that corresponds to a letter with a receipt Natalie found in their mail box. The receipt printed out in Shanamore Cottages. If you read the blurb, you know what follows. A woman is brutally attacked in one of the cottages and stabbed to death. This gruesome scene is captured on a video by one of the cameras instaled all over the cottage. As the manager watches in horror at what is happening, the killer, wearing a balaclava and black clothes, calmly walks towards the bedstand and switches off the camera. Who could have known Andrew's dirty secret and what is going to happen next? It is quite difficult to discuss the plot without giving major spoilers. The way the story is narrated is quite original. There are several points of view (at least five, by my count), but the characters are very distinct and get more and more fleshed out as the story progresses. The narrattive is not linear, so we also get flashbacks/rewinds that explain the events and show us why the character ended up leading their life the way they do or why they made this or that particular choice. We also get pause scenes and fast forwards that show the consequences of their actions. All this might sound confusing, but Catherine Ryan Howard's writing skill makes the story hold together in an effortless way. I was totally fascinated by the characters, both primary and secondary, the victim, the investigators and the villains, every single one of them has their unique voice and is well-developed. Some of them you will like or at least understand/relate to, while the others are really creepy, and no amount of background could make me understand their mentality and their propensities. As the narrative is quite complicated, it helps that the setting is limited to Dublin and Shanamore. We get a glimpse into what Irish life is like after the downturn of the economy destroyed many illusions nurtured by the phenomenon of the Celtic Tiger. We see it in the description of Audrey, a graduate struggling to keep her badly-paid job in the Entertainment section of an online paper, a 'click factory', and Carla, Natalie's best friend, who feels left behind and a bit bitter towards the people like Natalie, people who found their social media niche and are cashing on it. It does come at a price, of course. We all know that the price is privacy and personal safety, although Mike and Natalie seem to think that the way she posts is going to allow her to keep their family life separate. If you are like me, you might find yourself thinking about parallels with a few iconic films. Psycho and Memento are just two that spring to my mind. The reason for this is that the writing is smart and full of vivid images, and you have to put all the pieces of the puzzle together to work out the story of the woman on the tape. A clever whodunnit, told in an unusual but compelling way, Rewind will keep you glued to the pages until the end. Thank you to Edelweiss and Blackstone Publishing for the ARC provided in exchange for an honest opinion. Comments are closed.
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