Into the Dark by Fiona Cummins
Genre: Psychological thriller
Read: 13th April 2022
Published: 14th April 2022
★★★★ 3.5 stars (rounded up)
DESCRIPTION:
Into the Dark is the new dark and gripping crime thriller from Fiona Cummins about revenge, greed, ambition and the true cost of friendship.
THE PLACE: Seawings, a beautiful Art Deco home overlooking the sweep of the bay in Midtown-on-Sea.
THE CRIME: The gilded Holden family - Piper and Gray and their two teenage children, Riva and Artie - has vanished from the house without a trace.
THE DETECTIVE: DS Saul Anguish, brilliant but with a dark past, treads the narrow line between light and shade.
One late autumn morning, Piper’s best friend arrives at Seawings to discover an eerie scene – the kettle is still warm, all the family’s phones are charging on the worktop, the cars are in the garage. But the house is deserted.
In fifteen-year-old Riva Holden’s bedroom, scrawled across the mirror in blood, are three words:
Make
Them
Stop.
What happens next?
MY REVIEW:
I've only read one Fiona Cummins book, "Rattle", that I absolutely loved for it deliciously dark nature that set it apart from the rest. And it seems she has continued her "collector" theme in INTO THE DARK as well as her dark writing style. To be honest, I still have mixed feelings upon finishing this very twisted thriller that I still not entirely sure how I feel about it.
Julianne Hillier and Piper Holden have been close friends since their children were very young. Their daughters - Emelie and Riva - are best friends while their sons, Henry and Artie, are more indifferent to each other. The two women both appear to have the perfect family on the surface with successful husbands, beautiful homes and financially comfortable. But all to often things are never what they seem.
One morning Julianne arrives at Seawings, the Holdens exclusive palatial beachfront home, for their regular morning run. But upon arrival, Piper fails to appear. She knocks but no one answers. She calls her friend's landline which only rings out. Peering through the large living room window there is no sign of life inside. Then the Holden's cleaner arrives and the two women enter the house together. What they discover there seems to be no explanation for.
An unzipped schoolbag dumped hastily in the hall. The radio plays from the kitchen where the smell of coffee and burnt toast lingers. The coffee pot is still warm. Half eaten cereal bowls and milk splashed about the counter. Piper's handbag sits half opened. Three mobile phones are plugged into their chargers alongside a set of keys. Gray's car is on the drive. Piper's car and Gray's collection of cars are in the garage.
The house is empty.
Piper, Gray and their children, Riva and Artie, are nowhere to be found.
And then they find blood on the chandelier and a bloody message on Riva's bedroom mirror - the words "Make them stop".
Enter DC Saul Anguish, newly seconded to Essex's Major Crime Unit, as his team is tasked with the investigation into the missing family. He takes a keen interest in Dr Clover March, whom he nicknames Blue - for the colour of her hair - and who, along with him, appears to be hiding a secret as well. Maybe this is what has drawn him to her. Kindred spirits maybe. But as they dig deeper into the mystery of the Holdens, they soon discover that nothing is as it seems.
Filled with horrible characters who do equally horrible things, INTO THE DARK is a dark and disturbing tale that is twisted in more ways than one. Who is the real monster here? Because they are all equally weird. I still don't know what to think of it all though I did find it engrossing and page-turning it was definitely one twisted and somewhat weird ride. But then Ms Cummins' first thriller "Rattle" was very dark with a major twist although I read that many years ago I don't remember it clearly. But I was surprised to learn that DC Saul Anguish (an unfortunate name, I admit) featured in that debut and it's sequel "The Collector" (which I have yet to read). I honestly don't remember him though...it was that long ago. But maybe that is where the "collector" theme stems from...those two books. Although INTO THE DARK is not marketed as a connected story to those first two books despite the same character featuring in them.
The story unfolds through various characters' perspectives and jumps back and forth between "Before" and "After" the Holden's disappearance. It can get a little confusing with the to-ing and fro-ing and whose narrative we are following at any given time. There is a method to that madness as readers are drip-fed tidbits throughout gradually revealing the bigger picture. And it ends up to be one big tangled twisted mess. By the end my head was spinning.
There is little more I can say about this twisted tale without revealing too much. Let's just say, read it yourself and you'll see what I mean. And trust no one...and I mean NO ONE!
A multi-layered complex and twisted tale, INTO THE DARK is a very dark and sometimes disturbing read with a multitude of shocking twists and deception. If you like your thrillers dark, disturbing and twisted, then you will surely enjoy INTO THE DARK. Perfect for fans of Katerina Diamond and Val McDermid.
I would like to thank #FionaCummins, #Netgalley, #PanMacmillan for an ARC of #IntoTheDark in exchange for an honest review.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
Rattle, her debut, has been translated into several languages and Marcel Berlins wrote in The Times: 'Amid the outpouring of crime novels, Rattle is up there with the best of them.' Fiona was selected for McDermid's prestigious New Blood panel at the 2017 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, where her novel was nominated for a Dead Good Reader Award for Most Exceptional Debut. A sequel, The Collector, was published in February 2018 and David Baldacci described it as 'A crime novel of the very first order'.
Her third novel - standalone thriller The Neighbour - was published in April 2019. Ian Rankin called it 'creepy as hell'. Her fourth novel When I Was Ten, an Irish Times bestseller, was published in April 2021. Into The Dark, Fiona's fifth novel, will be published in April 2022 and was described by Sarah Vaughan, author of Netflix smash-hit Anatomy of A Scandal, as 'Complex. Inventive. Twisty. Unsettling.'
When Fiona is not writing, she can be found on Twitter, eating biscuits or walking her dogs. She lives in Essex with her family.
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