Title: STONE MOTHERS
Expected publication: out now
My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟1/2
Book Description:
'The Victorians used to call their mental hospitals stone
mothers,' I say. 'They thought the design of the building could literally nurse
the sick back to health.'
Marianne grew up in the shadow of the old asylum, a place
that still haunts her dreams. She was seventeen when she fled the town, her
family, her boyfriend Jesse and the body they buried.
Now, forced to return, she can feel the past closing around
her. And Jesse, who never forgave her for leaving, is finally threatening to
expose the truth.
Marianne will do anything to protect the life she's built;
the husband and daughter who must never know.
Even if it means turning to her worst enemy...
But Marianne may not know the whole story - and she isn't
the only one with secrets they'd kill to keep.
My musings:
I absolutely adored Erin Kelly’s book HE SAID SHE SAID, so
imagine my excitement when I won an ARC of her latest book!
The book is being told from the POV of three different
characters and three very distinct timelines. Starting in the present, we hear
from Marianne, who has had to give up her job in order to spend more time
helping her sister look after their mother, who has advanced dementia. To
surprise her, her husband has bought them a unit in the historical building of
the Nazareth Mental Hospital, now a modern apartment block for the wealthy. He
thought she would be pleased, and her horror of setting foot on the property
surprises him. What lies in Marianne’s past that makes her so reluctant to
return to her old hometown of Nusstead?
STONE MOTHERS is yet another book that will go on my list of
great settings this year. The Nazareth Mental Hospital is a brilliant and eerie
setting – what can possibly bring more chills than an abandoned asylum with a
dark past? I loved exploring the old brick building in my mind, wondering its
corridors with dread and fascination alike. Kelly has a way with words that
really brought this setting to life for me!
The one thing I wasn’t totally fond of was the timeline
here. It’s one of those books where all the main characters share a deep dark
secret, and everything revolves around this secret, only that we are not privy
to finding out what it’s all about. I felt like the one person in the crowd
that has no idea what everyone is talking about – too close to real life, lol.
Without that knowledge, it was difficult initially to understand the
characters’ motivations, which at times seemed a bit farfetched and extreme to
me. It wasn’t until the timeline switched to Marianne’s teenage years that we
get to find out what all the fuss was about and things started making more
sense.
Of all the characters, I liked Helen’s story the best and
could have read much more about her youth. She was such a complex character,
and her story was so compelling! I also felt a lot more connection to teenage
Marianne than to her present day self, and could have spent the entire book
walking the dark corridors of the abandoned asylum. One thing I really appreciated
about the different timelines was the way the characters all ended linking up,
and the threads connecting, and little details coming into focus that I may
otherwise have overlooked.
Summary:
STONE MOTHERS is a slow, character driven story with a
brilliant atmospheric setting created by a master storyteller. Even though I
struggled initially with the format of the book, it ended up an enjoyable read
and Helen’s story especially evoked a lot of emotions. Lovers of atmospheric
settings will really appreciate this one, as it was quite unique!
Thank
you to Hachette Australia for the free copy of this novel and
for giving me the opportunity to provide an honest review.
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