This is the debut novel from Tracy Sierra, an attorney who lives in a New England antique colonial-era home complete with its own secret room.
When a widower mother, home alone with her children during a blizzard, hears a noise in the middle of the night, she knows something is wrong. It’s the sound of footsteps, heavy and slow, coming up the stairs. When she sees the figure of a man down the hallway, she quietly wakes her children and leads them into a tiny, secret room concealed behind a wall in the office. There they hide as the man attempts to find them, taunting and threatening the mother into surrender. When the man moves to search the attic, the mother leaves her children hidden and rushes out into the storm to find help, running through the snow in slippers. Upon arriving at the closest neighbour’s home, a far distance away, she’s badly injured from having fallen in the snow. The police soon arrive, and the woman is taken back to her home, where there’s no evidence of anyone having been there other than her children hidden. The woman is taken to the hospital while her children are sent to their grandfather. What follows is a disturbing few days where the mother’s sanity is put into question while she struggles to recover from her injuries. But amidst all the confusion, the woman realizes she knows this man, and her situation is more dire than she’d feared.
This locked-room thriller is an intense, rollercoaster listen. The story jumps right into an intruder in the house and the mother guiding her children to safety in a secret room. From there, the story toggles between present and past, giving the audience clues about the mother’s past, her mental health, and the identity of the supposed intruder. The shifts between present and past are so frequent and sometimes unexpected that the continuity of the story can sometimes feel blurry. The names of the mother and her children are never revealed, which further adds to the overall ambiguity and dream-like feel of the story. There are many pulse-pounding moments after the mother decides to leave her children hidden to seek help, as she escapes the house and ventures into the night in a snowstorm. In the first half of the story, you’ll see some major loopholes in the plot, but rest assured that some well-placed reveals later on will remedy all that.
Narrator Emily Ellet does an impressive job narrating the mother, portraying a woman in a constant state of tension and inner turmoil. Her well-placed emotional outbursts and drama not only enhance the entertainment value but also leave listeners wondering if the entire story is a figment of the mother’s unstable mind. Overall, this is a very impressive debut novel with a unique storyline and plenty of suspense. If the premise sounds intriguing, don’t hesitate to try this one!