A fantastic, fast-paced thriller which is incredibly unsettling, check out The Heatwave by Kate Riordan.

The plot:

Elodie was beautiful. Elodie was smart. Elodie was troubled. Elodie is dead.

Sylvie hasn’t been back to La Reverie, her crumbling family home, in years. Not since the death of her eldest daughter, Elodie.

Every corner of the old house feels haunted by memories of her – memories Sylvie has tried to forget. But as temperature rise, and forest fires rage across the French countryside, a long-buried family secret is about to come to light.

Because there’s something Sylvie’s been hiding about what really happened to Elodie that summer.

Intense, unpredictable and a little bit sinister

This is a bit of a difficult one to give a full review for, because it’ll include a lot of spoilers, so I’m not going to mention much about the plot to avoid this. It’s split into two parts, and the plot twist happens mid-way through.

You know when you finish a psychological thriller and you’re haunted, but also begging for more? That was definitely me with The Heatwave. It ticks all the boxes for the genre – a good plot twist which you won’t see coming (I thought it was going to go an entirely different way), lots of tension and a shocking ending.

Chapters are short and sweet with lots of conversation, making it incredibly pacey – 70 pages just flies away from you as if it’s only been 10 pages. Chapters are also split between different years – 1 or 2 variations, I can handle, but this seemed to jump around too much, knocking it down from a perfect 5-star. I get why it’s been done like this, and definitely adds volume to the plot with some cliff-hangers, however I just found it too confusing, and had to check back to previous chapters to check I was in the right year.

It’s set in premillennial France (small amounts of basic French used), which I adored – it gave the story the perfect atmosphere, especially as we see more of the forest fires, and how a small, close-knit town can affect things.

I thought the characters were great – you have Sylvie, whom we see in the first part struggle with going back to the house she is haunted by, and uncover how she dealt with Elodie and the loss. Emma plays a big role, and her personality really comes out during the second part. Even the minor characters all seem to have something to add – it wasn’t complicated (albeit not an easy read either) and the themes came across really well.

It involves family relationships and traits (no spoilers, so see for yourself!), which Riordan has written beautifully.

Not your bog-standard thriller – intense, unpredictable and a little bit sinister. 4-stars (only due to the chapters), and I’d highly recommend.

The Heatwave, Kate Riordan, RRP £7.99 (paperback); Book Depository 

Pages: 374

Publisher: Penguin Books

Genre: Thriller