She Treads Softly: The Lake House Children

Friday, September 13, 2024

The Lake House Children

The Lake House Children by Gregg Dunnett
9/18/24; 356 pages
Storm Publishing

The Lake House Children by Gregg Dunnett is a highly recommended domestic mystery with some supernatural elements.

FBI Agent Jim McGee is close to retirement and is assigned one last case. There was been a lethal fire at a family's lake house resulting in four deaths. One of the survivors, Kate Marshall, is a prime suspect for setting the fire and she is being interviewed by McGee and his partner Billy Robbins. When he instructs Kate to tell him what really happened, she does. Her tale leading up to the fire starts a few years before the fire, the weekend when the three sisters and their families were invited to come spend the weekend at the lake house where their father lives. This was the weekend their father died.

The well-written narrative will immediately grab your attention as it focuses on Kate's story. It closely follows her family, her husband Nick and young son Jack, along with her relationship with her two older sisters. The plot unfolds through the interview, the bulk of which is Kate telling her story along with occasional breaks in her monologue which flips to McGee's point-of-view.

Part of Kate's tale includes her son Jack insisting he used to be someone else. At first, when he was a toddler, what Jack was trying to say was unintelligible, but became comprehensible as he got older. At age four what he was saying was clear. Nick, a scientist, is dismissive of their son's claims, but Kate is convinced Jack is telling the truth. This is a huge part of the plot and requires readers to believe that what Jack is saying is true.

There are many other compelling parts to this family drama, including enough bad behavior and questionable actions by many of the extended family members to hold your attention. There are a few surprising reveals the serve to propel the drama forward and keep the tension high. Thanks to Storm Publishing for providing me with an advance reader's copy via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and expresses my honest opinion.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.