My debut novel, Darkrooms, brings the reader into a gloomy, drizzly Irish town to hunt for the killer hidden in a tight-knit community where nothing can stay in the dark forever. When I thought about writing this book, it was the sense of place that came to me first.
Ireland is such an evocative setting, lush and green and easy to idealize, but the coziness and warmth of woollen jumpers round the roaring fire of a rustic pub exists alongside the long, dark nights and unforgiving landscapes. Narrow roads that wind dangerously close to cliff-sides and isolated homes buried in fields where anything could happen and not be seen or heard. The invented town of Bannakilduff became almost a character in the book.
However, I am nothing if not for the girls. Set against this backdrop, I wanted to explore the lives of two very different women in the aftermath of the disappearance of a young girl.
Both women are difficult in their own ways; as vulnerable as they are spiteful, and as wounded as they are vindictive, and neither fit into their communities. I’m interested in how society itself can be difficult for women, with all the expectations of who we should be and what our lives should look like.
These crime book picks balance both elements, they all tackle ideas of what it is to move through the world as a woman, and they all do it within uniquely immersive and vividly rendered settings.
*
Kate Kemp, The Grapevine
Set in 1979, the severed foot of a recent Italian migrant to a small Australian suburb is found in the mountains and the whole neighbourhood is rocked. Kemp introduces us to a cross-section time capsule of Australian society and culture, deftly balancing the perspectives of a large cast of characters.
At its core, this novel is interested in how women of all backgrounds and economics states reacted not only to a new burgeoning wave of feminism and cultural changes but also to their very individual desires—to be seen, to be heard, to be loved, to be safely themselves. As much commentary as it is mystery, the characters and the unlikely relationships they forge, will stick with you.
Bonnie Burke-Patel, I Died At Fallow Hall
A dual timeline book set mostly in the grounds and environs of a crumbling old manor house in the British countryside where, in the present day, a skeleton with a gunshot hole in its skull is discovered. Not only is Fallow Hall rendered so convincingly, but Burke-Patel’s character study of Anne shows a woman grappling with questions of what society demands of women—and what it takes to rebuke those demands.
Through a cast of well-rounded characters, Burke-Patel tackles gender dynamics alongside a genuinely moving love story and the investigation of a twisty historical crime.
Emma Van Straaten, Creep
A book that I immediately loved, Creep is an often uncomfortably close look at female obsession and twisted desire. Alice cleans Tom’s flat but she also reads his books at his pace, uses his toothbrush, checks his diary, and is convinced that they will one day be together romantically. Tom, of course, has never spared her a second thought or even met her in person.
She moves through a London and Paris colored by Tom, forever playing out her fantasies of how life will be once they’re together, right up until the queasy conclusion. Alice is many things; arch and darkly funny, sneaking and underhand, but she’s completely unforgettable.
Winnie M. Li, Complicit
In the aftermath of a Hollywood scandal, a film tutor is contacted by a famous journalist for comment on her all-too-brief career as a producer. Framed as an interview with the journalist, our protagonist, Sarah shows us Hollywood with all its grime and glamour through the desperate eyes of someone who came from nothing and is constantly on the verge of ending up back there.
In one of the most striking moments for me, Sarah winds up in a Chinese restaurant much like the one her family own, in the middle of the night seeking nourishment in so much more than food; community, acceptance, and understanding. It’s a testament to Li that I still see glowing sign of this restaurant in the hot LA night when I think of it.
Not only beautifully written, Complicit is a complex and morally murky character study, it’s a meditation on guilt, culpability, and abuses of power.
Tom Benn, Oxblood
The story of several generations of women who have outlived the local gangster men that they married, loved, or were born to, Oxblood is a distinctly Mancunian book. Set in the 80s and written in dialect, the reader is transported totally into an underworld marked by ever-present danger and loss.
It’s a truly unique and striking reading experience, and grows ever more so as with every page the reader is drawn further into the minds of the women. An often bleak look at what seems predestined and the ways the actions of men can shatter the lives of the women who love them.
Rebecca Makkai, I Have Some Questions For You
In Makkai’s critique of true crime, we meet a podcaster revisiting her old boarding school and finding herself unable to resist the pull of the unsolved murder of her old roommate. The setting is so precise, detailed and vivid that I could have drawn a map of the campus. An entire world is created within this book.
This attention to not only the spirit of true crime but the kind of nitty-gritty details that armchair detectives obsess over gives the whole novel a very lived-in sense, I felt enveloped in the world. Thematically drawing on the MeToo era, I found this to be a stark examination of the rampant rape culture of the 90s and 00s in a way I haven’t seen elsewhere.
The plot is tight and the writing is sharp, especially in the use of second-person segments wherein the protagonist lays out her theories for her imagined audience of murderers. It’s the kind of book that you can’t help but talk about for weeks afterwards.
***
