Hi hello, I am back to once again scream and shout about a book!
Gonna just say it right up top: I really liked this book and it has officially solidified me as a Catriona Ward stan.
Not that there was really a question–I was kind of hooked immediately upon reading Sundial. I read Last House on Needless Street with my horror book club and we all loved that one, too—but in general, 3 books author is the magic number for me before I can definitively call myself a fan of an author, so Little Eve locked it in.
I was extremely excited to snag an ‘advance’ copy—Although my understanding is that Little Eve originally published in the UK circa 2018 (at that time it won the Shirley Jackson award for Best Novel and the British Fantasy Award’s August Derleth prize for Best Horror Novel!) and is now being re-release for a wider audience following Ward’s recent success with her aforementioned other (fantastic) novels. Little Eve will be for sale in the US (and elsewhere, I assume?) on October 11 and imo will make a great read for spooky season!
Mentioned above already but standard disclaimer - I received an advanced e-copy of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts from Tor Nightfire/Netgalley.
Briefly, the summary:
Little Eve takes place almost entirely on the fictional island of Altnaharra, off the remote coast of Scotland, around the time of the first world war first World War. As she did in Sundial and The Last House on Needless Street, Ward introduces us to a “family” who are more than they first appear to be. The main characters are two teenagers in the family: Eve and Dinah. The rest of the family is comprised of a man referred to only as Uncle (their patriarch), two adult women, and two other children.
Though I don’t think it is ever explicitly stated on page, the “family” is actually a cult, and the book details the daily lives of living within that environment, including their many complex beliefs, stories, and rituals.
The book opens with a brutal murder, and from there we travel back and forth in time (in the style of her other books, this is told in alternating timelines—a style which I personally enjoy) slowly unwraveling pieces of the story. What happened at Altnaharra? What’s up with that family, anyway? Through the perspectives of Eve and Dinah, the reader slowly picks up on pieces of the mystery, until we reach an absolutely crushing ending.
This was such a compelling story and I am thrilled to sa that it was just as dark, gothic, and twisty as her first two books. Am I obsessed? Yes.
Thoughts (no spoilers).
As stated 100 times already, I loved this one. It had a little bit of a slow start for me, but once things got going, I was sucked in.
One thing that I really appreciated about this book was the detail with which Ward described the rituals and daily life on Altnaharra, and how intricately Ward was able to weave in the classic signs/symptoms of a ‘cult’ without ever, on page, calling it a cult. (Charismatic leader, bizarre ideological belief system, extreme control over the members, punishment tactics for anyone who deviates or questions anything, isolation, apocalyptic thinking….etc etc). It was clear to me that Ward did a lot of research here to really build up a realistic cult-dynamic. I felt this way as well about Needless Street (re: her research into mental health) and even Sundial—she doesn’t half-ass it, she really goes deep to give the reader a a level of detail that feels authentic.
Interesting as well was that we have a bit of an unreliable narration (Ward is excellent at this) because the characters through which we are told the story do not recognize anything being odd about their lives or their cultish beliefs—at least not right away. Eve and Dinah don’t know anything different than the lives that they have, so when we are being told the story through their perspective, it is never explicitely stated that anything is amiss—the reader kind of comes to that realization on our own.
The book was…deeply unsettling. It is really dark, and creepy. Ward has this great ability to really build tension and I absolutely love it. I also feel like having read now three of her books, I can see plenty of threads that she likes to weave into her writing–themes of family, loyalty, and obsession come through in all of her stories, but I also think that each of these three books manages to be distinctly unique in their own right.
There is, of course, a twist. I will say that in this case, I did kind of guess the twist early in the book, but that’s okay! I think the “oof” moment is not really in the twist itself; it was having to rethink the whole story via the implications of the twist that is the gut punch.
I should mention as well that there are some pretty gruesome scenes in this one that really squigged me out. If body horror is not your jam…you might find yourself skimming a few sections.
It’s hard to say much more without revealing spoilers, so I’ll leave it there. I really, really liked this book and would definitely recommend to fans of her other two–or if you haven’t read those, for fans of murder mystery, horror, and gothic stories.
HOWEVER!!! I need to warn that this comes with big ol Trigger Warnings for like…all of the things (because, you know, cults).
Related bonus recommendations:
If you are into cult stories and haven’t yet read Godshot by Chelsea Bieker, I’d recommend that one too!
Lately I have been *loving* Sounds Like a Cult Podcast which looks at how every day things are kind of culty.
Anyway, I am happy to say that we are officially in SPOOKY SEASON and I look forward to bothering you all with my incessant thoughts about horror, thrillers, mysteries…moreso than I do the rest of the year? Is that possible?
-Amy