Sara-Jayne Townsend is a published crime and horror writer and likes books in which someone dies horribly. She is founder and Chair Person of the T Party Writers’ Group. http://sarajaynetownsend.weebly.com/
Nine years ago, Charlie Colbert was a student at an elite graduate school when a brutal attack on Christmas Eve made headlines – dubbed as ‘Scarlet Christmas’. As the only surviving witness to what happened, Charlie’s testimony was infamously taken at face value.
Now editor-in-chief at a major magazine and engaged to the heir of a wealthy publishing family, Charlie’s successful new life is threatened when the sister of one of the victims (now a movie director) plans to make a film adaptation of that fateful night, revealing (possibly) the truth about what happened - because Charlie’s recollections of that night may not be true.
This is the premise driving this book. However the big hook is that in order to find out what really happened on ‘Scarlet Christmas’ and what Charlie could be lying about, propels the narrative forcing the reader to keep turning the pages.
There are expectations around psychological thrillers, and this one doesn’t disappoint the reader. It is evident that Charlie is carrying around psychological trauma from the events of that tragic night, but she may also be an unreliable narrator in consequence.
The timeline jumps back and forth between the events leading up to that night and what’s happening now (another trope of psychological thrillers), interspersed with extracts from a book that was written about ‘Scarlet Christmas’ by an investigative journalist; a book that interviewed people who were involved (but which Charlie refused to participate in). For me this did make the story a tad confusing to follow at times, but many readers do enjoy this writing style.
This engrossing book kept me turning pages – I wanted to know what really happened that night, and why Charlie was so afraid of the truth coming out.
I found the big reveal a little less climactic than I’d been anticipating, however I thoroughly enjoyed the journey to get there.
If you’re into psychological thrillers then I would highly recommend this utterly gripping debut novel wholeheartedly.
