Everything Is Lies by Helen Callaghan

With a title like that, the reader knows to expect the unexpected – twists and surprises aplenty – like many books in this genre. Not only are there family secrets on a grand scale, you are caught up in a plot where you just don’t know who can be trusted. How can you when everything is lies?

At the start of the book, twenty-six-year-old Sophie makes a shock discovery when she visits her parents to find her mother dead and her father stabbed and barely alive – a supposed case of murder-suicide. As her father lies in a coma in hospital, Sophie finds a letter from a publisher, delighted to accept her mother’s memoir.

Meeting the publisher only confirms what Sophie already believes, that her mother had everything to live for. But where are her mother’s notebooks, the script that the publisher has heard about but not yet read? And who promises to publish a manuscript from an unknown author sight unseen? Someone who is about to blow the lid on a cult, for one. For Nina, Sophie’s mother, had been a resident at Morningstar, run by the handsome and wayward ex-pop star, Aaron Kessler.

The novel follows Sophie’s investigations in search of the notebooks, her growing fears and suspicions that cult members may have had a hand in the attack on her parents. Woven in is Nina’s story, told in her own words – how she met the charismatic Aaron Kessler, and became spellbound. The story gives an excellent look at how mesmerising and bullying cults can be to anyone willing to believe; the drugs, rituals and rhetoric that make it difficult to be your own person.

Helen Callaghan has written another complete page-turner, and while it was easy to imagine the worst, and it so often comes to pass, there were still a few surprises in the story, though perhaps not as many as I might have hoped for.

Everything Is Lies is a welcome addition to the Chick Noir genre that is currently so popular, and Helen Callaghan has a particular talent for unusual plot scenarios. I shall be looking out for her next book for sure.

Posted by JAM

Catalogue link: Everything Is Lies

See You in September by Charity Norman

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"It doesn't look like a scene of death.  It looks like paradise."

So says Diana in the prologue to See You in September, while visiting the site of a cult her daughter Cassy had belonged to.

In See You in September twenty-one year old Cassy goes on a backpacking holiday to New Zealand with her boyfriend, and becomes entangled in a cult.

When Cassy discovers she is pregnant, then breaks up with her boyfriend while hitching a ride to Taupo she is rescued by a van of irresistibly shiny happy people. They persuade her to detour to their remote and beautiful self-sufficient farm on the shores of Lake Tarawera.

Cassy is treated warmly and soon becomes part of the extended 'family'. She begins an idyllic relationship with kind and competent Aden; whose wife walked out on him with two of their children, leaving one behind. Justin, the enigmatic leader of the group lives on an island on the lake and is loved by all.
However, lack of reliable cell phone coverage and internet lead to frantic worry for her parents at home in England.

Cleverly and terrifyingly woven through the story are excerpts from a scholars study on The Cult Leader’s Manual: Eight Steps to Mind Control.
What could possibly go wrong…?

Author Charity Norman is well-known to Hawke's Bay readers. She is a lively and generous speaker, an ex-barrister who was born to missionary parents in Uganda, grew up in England, and married a Hawke's Bay man. Norman always explores an interesting and different theme for each of her novels. For her previous novel The Secret Life of Luke Livingston her main character was a transgender person; other novels have focused on adoption, ex-convicts, and methamphetamine use in teenagers.
Reviewers have likened her to Jodi Picoult and Joanna Trollope. I would agree to some extent but must say I enjoy Norman’s books more. She has moved into the realm of my ‘safe bet’ authors; one of those favourites for whom you look forward to new releases from and know you will enjoy reading them.
She has also released an ebook short story called Best Served Cold, about Cassy’s younger sister Tara, which is available at Hastings District Libraries eBook platform ePukapuka.

Reviewed by Katrina

Catalogue link: See You in September

Always Watching by Chevy Stevens

I first discovered Chevy Stevens when I read her first novel, Still Missing. Still Missing follows a realtor who is kidnapped by a potential client and spends a year as his captive. I followed that up with Never Knowing, a book about an adopted women trying to find her birth parents. Once she find her mother she discovers that she was the only living survivor of a well known serial killer. While I was searching the shelves to find something to read I stumbled across Always Watching.

I enjoyed reading Always Watching and I managed to read it curled up by the fire in one night. I found myself developing my own theories about what was happening and who might be responsible- some which were correct and some which missed the mark entirely.  At times I did think the author had stretched some events out into the slightly unbelievable but I was willing to overlook it and I have put her other books on my ‘to read’ list.

Dr Nadine has recently given herself a new start. In her mid fifties, she is widowed, experiences bouts of severe claustrophobia, repressed memories and is estranged from her only daughter who has been living rough on the streets for the last seven years. She has given up her private practice, moved cities and begun working in the psychiatric ward of the hospital. She is in her element there, she can help people, heal people and rebuild lives. It is her safe haven.

Heather is admitted to the psychiatric ward after an attempted suicide. Nadine finds herself drawn to Heather and once she begins to unravel her story she begins to see connections between their lives. Both women have spent parts of their lives living in a commune. Heather recently, Nadine during her early teenage years.

As Nadine’s interest in her new patient begins to border on obsession and the lines of professionalism blurring, her past is quickly catching up to her. With Nadine, Heather and every else she holds dear in danger, she must begin to face her past and find the cause of her repressed memories before it finds her.

Reviewed by Kristen

Catalogue link:  Always Watching

The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes

“I am a blood soaked girl.”

Right from the first line I was hooked.

The book follows Minnow Bly (obviously) as she finally escapes from the Kevinian cult where she spent the last twelve years of her life. She is promptly arrested for the violent assault on a young man, questioned about the destruction of the community where she lived, the death of its Prophet, and is shipped off to juvie.

Oh, and she has no hands.

We learn right away that they were cut off by someone at the community, but it is through a series of flash backs and interviews that the story of her dark past comes to light. We come see how she was always struggling against ‘The Prophet’ and his strict way of life; she was whipped and beaten for any disobedience, her once close mother became distant and emotionally removed, her sister (born in the community) served the Prophet with religious zeal and would not leave the community no matter how hard Minnow tried, and we finally learn the horrific truth about her hands, and the lengths that the Prophet would go to make sure that his will was followed.

I honestly didn’t know what to expect when I picked up this book. The Kevinian religion seemed quite ridiculous – God was born in the 1700’s and is a boy named Charlie, and women were forbidden to read or voice their opinions and had no choice over who they would marry. Anyone who questioned the Prophet was punished, in some cases by death. They were incredibly sexist and racist and all the things that most cults are portrayed as being. But Minnow's story was so interesting and heartbreaking that I kept reading. It was horrific, dark and definitely not for the faint-hearted, full of incredible details, allegations of sexual abuse, and a (quite tame) look at what goes on at a juvenile detention centre. I wouldn’t recommend it for those new to the YA section, but it is definitely a book I think you should read.

Posted by Sas

Catalogue link: The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly