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355 pages, Hardcover
First published September 5, 2019
Looking back, it’s tempting to say I knew from the start, as soon as Paddy said the word for the first time. I can nearly convince myself I shivered at the sound of it. Simmerton.
But I’d be lying. Truth is, there was a while back then when everything seemed fine. Or even better than fine. Everything seemed golden.
[The gate lodge] was squat and squint, with one bulbous bay window, like a toad’s eye, lumpy harling the colour of mud. Cottages, I reckoned, should be whitewashed with thatched roofs and you should live in them for a week, then go home. Still, I’d agreed to a year of this, so I tried to find a bright side…
One year, I told myself. I knew I could do a year. It wouldn’t be the first time. I would get used to the quiet. And the trees. I would stop seeing them out of the corner of my eye and thinking someone was there. If only they looked a bit less like a silent army of strangers standing dead still and watching me. Or if only the ones at the edge didn’t wave as the wind stirred them, looking as if they were shuffling their feet, just about to speak. If only there weren’t faces etched into the swirl of the bark, knot-hole mouths wide open and black eyes weeping resin tears.