A Flicker in the Dark

Captivating Debut

Sabrina Reiter aus Wien, Donauzentrum am 25.01.2022
Bewertungsnummer: 1644414
Bewertet: Buch (Gebundene Ausgabe)

„A Flicker in the Dark“ is a captivating debut that will keep you guessing until the very end. When Chloe was only twelve years old, her father was arrested for murdering six teenage girls. Now, 20 years later, the traumatic memories come flooding back when a young girl from her neigbourhood goes missing…and then another one. Why is the killer’s MO eerily similar to her father’s? After all, he’s still in prison and can’t be responsible. Terrified and out of control, she finds herself in the center of police investigations. „A Flicker in the Dark“ starts off a little bit slow-paced but somehow never gets boring, regardless. I liked the sinister vibes the story gives off and how it keeps you on your toes. Also, I had a really hard time to decide who is to believed and who isn’t, which I found very intriguing. Chloe is an unreliable narrator if ever there was one. Not only is she self-medicating with prescription drugs, she also has never dealt with her past trauma properly. The resulting anxiety and phobias don’t exactly make her appear to be very trustworthy. While it was obvious to me that everything she says should be taken with a grain of salt, I never questioned her good intentions. My opinion on the other characters, however, kept changing multiple times over the course of the story. While I liked some of them from the start and became suspicous about them later on, I was annoyed by others right off the bat but found my animosity towards them wavering after a while. In my opinion, that just goes to show how good the author is at confusing and misleading her readers and I am definitely here for it. I recommend“A Flicker in the Dark“ to readers who have also enjoyed books like „Girl on the Train“ or „The Woman in Cabin 10“. If you have a soft spot for unreliable narrators or simply enjoy psychological thrillers that mess with your brain and keep you on your toes, you definitely shouldn’t miss Stacy Willingham’s debut.