Book Review: The Fire Child by S.K.Tremayne

Title: The Fire Child

Author: S.K. Tremayne

Publisher: HarperCollins UK

Date: June 16th, 2016

Pages: 400

Format: eARC

Source: from Publisher for a review

 

Synopsis (from Goodreads): The chilling new psychological thriller by S. K. Tremayne, author of the Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller, THE ICE TWINS.

When Rachel marries dark, handsome David, everything seems to fall into place. Swept from single life in London to the beautiful Carnhallow House in Cornwall, she gains wealth, love, and an affectionate stepson, Jamie.

But then Jamie’s behaviour changes, and Rachel’s perfect life begins to unravel. He makes disturbing predictions, claiming to be haunted by the spectre of his late mother – David’s previous wife. Is this Jamie’s way of punishing Rachel, or is he far more traumatized than she thought?

As Rachel starts digging into the past, she begins to grow suspicious of her husband. Why is he so reluctant to discuss Jamie’s outbursts? And what exactly happened to cause his ex-wife’s untimely death, less than two years ago? As summer slips away and December looms, Rachel begins to fear there might be truth in Jamie’s words:

‘You will be dead by Christmas.’

Review:

 

„The doubting the doubt is the beginning of faith.“

 

In the blurb for this book, they said it was chilling.
And it was.
I got chills multiple times as I was reading this brilliant, in a good way disturbing novel.

The story follows Rachel, a thirty years old woman who marries David, a rich widower, and moves into his big, beautiful house called Carnhallow, in Cornwall.

Cornwall is the place I read about in so many books, I can’t even count. But you know what? This was the first time I was reading a dark tale that was settled in that admirable place I’d like to visit one day.

I liked the atmosphere in this book. Nothing was perfectly clear and, often, it felt like I could picture the mist over the Cornwall and the whole story that S.K. Tremayne so talentedly presented to us.

What I liked the most was the fact that all characters, main and impotant side ones, were unreliable.
Jamie, Rachel, David, David’s mother Julie – they were all unpredictable and I couldn’t trust anyone.
Even the dead character, David’s first wife Nina, was untrustworthy.

This book messed with my head bigtime, and I welcomed it wholeheartedly.
It kept me on the edge of my seat, made me want to read faster and then made me feel angry I couldn’t.
It made me emotional, it made me scared for characters, it made me question my logic.
And those, in my opinion, are the signs of a well-done psychological thriller.

The story is written in two POVs: Rachel’s and David’s.
Rachel POV was written in first person and it had that power to pull you into the story. Majority of The Fire Child is written in Rachel’s POV, as she is the main character.
David’s POV was written in third person and even though there were only few chapters that told his perspective, they were important ones.

The writing style was pretty amazing. It was fast paced with some bigger words used from time to time.
S.K. Tremayne is one skilled writer who knows how to capture the intension and compel his readers.

This was my first time reading his work but it surely won’t be the last.
I already have his Ice Twins on my tbr and am happy to give it a go when I’ll be in a mood for something extremely thought provoking.