If you’re at all a fan of crime podcasts, or just crime books and horror in general, then you need to pick this one up! I’m very fussy with crime-y reads these days but this one was so unique and just ticked all the boxes!
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Scarclaw Fell, an imaginary spot in the wild Northumbrian countryside, gains notoriety when the body of a 15 year old boy is found in the marshes, 20 years after he first went missing on an outward bound with a Ranger group. Using murky testimonials from the four other teenagers and two adults who were there that night, elusive online journalist Scott King attempts to shed new light on the case, which was deemed as misadventure, with his popular podcast.
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I LOVE epistolary novels which are told through letters and diary entries, so it makes sense that I’d enjoy the structure of this one too, told in multiple flashbacks, interviews and police recordings. It allows you to see the story from many different perspectives, realising that not everything is as it seems and that there are two (or more) sides to every story.
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Wesolowski also brings in an element of horror, as the circumstances surrounding Tom’s death involve sinister legends that abound around the fells, of a long black figure, knocking at the door, and Nanna Wrack, a ghastly creature with a mane of tangled black hair seen skulking around the marshes. It had my skin CRAWLING at some points, and I had to go shut the curtains to make sure there were no shadowy figures peering in at me...
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My one complaint is that the characters at the time of the death were supposed to be 15 years old and I thought they read more like 17 or even 18 year olds, albeit slightly immature ones. I KNOW for a fact that 14 and 15 year olds get up to the stuff going down in this book, but I think especially to a US audience it would seem way more shocking.
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But still, a compelling and addictive read!!