TOO CLOSE TO HOME
Linwood Barclay
Bantam
Thriller
ISBN: 9780553805567
It would be easy to call Linwood Barclay’s latest work a “breakthrough novel.” But Barclay already has been garnering critical as well as growing popular acclaim, particularly in his native Canada, for his Zack Walker books. Perhaps more significantly, his stand-alone thriller, NO TIME FOR GOODBYE, has been nominated for enough literary awards to collapse a fireplace mantle; as I write this, it is in the middle of an astonishing though deserving run at the top of the London Sunday Times bestseller list. Having said all that, TOO CLOSE TO HOME is an even better book.
I believe the stories that resonate the most within us are the ones that strike closest to home; Barclay has been mining the veins of domestic terror for a while now and hits the mother lode in TOO CLOSE TO HOME. Derek Cutter is a healthy 17-year-old whose best friend, Adam Langley, happens to live next door. When Adam’s family takes a week’s vacation, Derek decides to execute a foolproof plan to access their house for a bit of romantic interlude time with his girlfriend. Unfortunately, she can’t make it and then the Langleys suddenly come back only an hour after they leave. While Derek is hiding in the basement, trying to figure out a way to sneak out of the house, someone comes in and murders the family.
A terrified Derek can’t even think of telling his parents, who have problems of their own. Indeed, Jim Cutter, whose first-person narration informs most of TOO CLOSE TO HOME, is more in the dark than the reader in the book’s first part. Jim, who used to be a driver for Randall Finley, the mayor of Promise Falls, New York (an upstate college town), is attempting to help support his family by running a landscaping service. Jim’s wife Ellen is employed at Thackeray College by Conrad Chase, the school president. A former English professor, Conrad has utilized his status as a one-and-done bestselling author to create a respected and popular literary festival, due in no small measure to Ellen’s organizational skills.
The Cutters are making ends meet, but barely. And no one is really happy. While Jim is well rid of Finley, his former employer (think Diamond Joe Quimby of “The Simpsons” without the charm), he is a failed artist, one who would rather be painting on a canvas than riding a mower. Ellen, meanwhile, has her own issues with her boss, which have quietly resolved themselves and yet continue to simmer uneasily. The Cutters’ problems --- small, though not unimportant, and certainly not unusual --- are suddenly brought to the forefront when the Langleys are found murdered. The police are not lacking for motives --- Adam’s father was a criminal defense attorney with no shortage of enemies --- yet it is Derek who provides the first potential clue as to the why, if not the who, behind the violent end of the family next door.
Adam and Derek enjoyed recovering discarded computers and tinkering with them; in the course of doing so, they often uncovered data on the hard drive that had been long forgotten. Derek, on a walkthrough of the house conducted by police detectives, notices that one of the computers is missing. He recalls it well because of what was on it: a print file that has the potential to shake the city of Promise Falls and one of its most famous citizens to its foundations. The police, however, are barely interested. They have discovered that Derek was in the house at the time of the murders and have a potential and convincing motive for why Derek is responsible. As the Cutters’ lives are turned upside down, Jim and Ellen must confront the truths and secrets of their own pasts, even as the killer of their next-door neighbors prepares to strike again. He is much closer than they ever can imagine.
Barclay has succeeded in producing a masterwork in TOO CLOSE TO HOME. You will want to race through it yet savor page by page to remember seemingly unimportant details whose significance will be revealed later. He waits until a third of the way through before making a major disclosure, one that resonates through the remainder of the novel both explicitly and implicitly. There are other bombshells, both great and small, that lurk in its pages, and part of the fun is attempting to discern what is most important. While Barclay’s trademark humor is toned down a bit here, Jim Cutter, like his creator, is the master of the quick retort. This is one of 2008’s standouts, from an author whose best work is yet to come.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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