Last One Out

Like her other five novels, Harper’s latest will take her fans by storm as she ventures into the world of her first female narrator in the form of Ro Crowley.

Five years after her son Sam’s 21st birthday disappearance, Ro returns to a diminished, mainly abandoned town for his annual memorial gathering with her ex-husband and daughter. All Sam left behind were footprints in three abandoned houses, a devastated and fractured family, and some research notes. He had never been found.

By the end of Chapter One I was invested. The devastation evoked by the scene of Sam’s disappearance, the solitude of the town, the splintered community and the incessant drone of the privately-owned coal mine standing off to the side, made for a stifling atmosphere. There was obviously more playing out here as the coal mine continued its inexorable eating up of reluctantly-sold land holdings, a process Sam was researching and about which his questions may have been confronting to some neighbours.

How do you survive the disappearance of your child? How do you deal with having to walk away from a loved family home as it becomes worthless? How do you create a rewarding life while those around you are leaving? How do you nurture children swamped by solitude? Interesting enough questions as we read but all accompanied by the disquiet and fear as we wonder what happened to Sam? Who knows? Why did he disappear? Who has secrets?

Thanks to Book Hero for an advanced copy of a truly unputdownable read.