A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham (HarperCollins, $33)
Stacy Willingham is a debut novelist but there is nothing in her assured and excellent first book that would give that away. From the first page of the prologue it is clear she knows exactly what she is doing.
Packed with cunningplot twists, sketchy characters and creepy settings, all delivered with a knowing nod to the Southern Gothic writers, A Flicker in the Dark is a genuinely heart-pounding read. What lifts it above the glut of gripping, pacy crime fiction landing now is the narrative perspective - a woman whose father is a convicted serial killer is retraumatised when young women in her orbit start to go missing.
A psychologist in private practice, Chloe Davis has spent 20 years trying to move past the awful summer when she was 12, when six teenage girls in her small hometown were killed by her devoted dad. She hasn't spoken to him since his arrest but she has devoted her life to understanding human behaviour in an effort to unpick the darkness that lies at the centre of her family, now shattered. Chloe is a victim, but one with a spine of steel. She's planning her wedding to the nearly perfect Daniel when her safe, carefully calibrated life takes a sickening turn.
Twenty years after her father's killing spree, a copycat appears to be at work in her neighbourhood.
A Flicker in the Dark is a cracking whodunnit but it also asks why people perpetrate violent crimes. What are the social, psychological and environmental factors that fuel this behaviour? Are some people simply born evil, or are serial killers made? Willingham also skillfully delves into drug addiction, grief, shame, perfectionism and the everyday fear that women live with - that someone will hurt them as they walk down a dark street or when they are alone at home.
Willingham does a stellar job of keeping multiple narrative strands and timelines taut. She flicks easily between Chloe's hometown murders and the present-day crimes, casting doubt on just about everyone in Chloe's life.
I did pick the big reveal at the end, but it was not overplayed. It's no surprise that actor Emma Stone has nabbed A Flicker in the Dark for series development with HBO Max. It will be a belter.
