Make yourself comfortable and set aside some time because once you open “That Night,” a novel by Linwood Barclay, you won’t be able to close it until you’ve reached the last page. Twists, incredibly intense suspense, careful writing—”That Night” truly deserves the success it is experiencing.
Cynthia is fourteen and it’s the first time she’s sneaked out to spend the evening with Vince, her boyfriend, a notorious neighborhood troublemaker. Brought home by her father, she collapses dead drunk on her bed. Upon waking, the house is deserted. The cupboards are full but the cars are gone, her family is no longer there but no suitcase has been packed, everything is in place yet no one is there. In one night, Cynthia becomes an orphan. Her father, mother, and brother have disappeared, vanished.
Twenty-five years later, the investigation has never been solved. Cynthia has built her life between doubt and resolution, absence inhabits her. Her own family, Terry, her husband, and their daughter Grace, support her. But questions haunt her. Is her family still alive? Why have they never contacted her? Are they dead? Killed by whom and why? Where are the bodies?
Questions that, thanks to a TV show, will find their answers…
Starting “That Night,” one doesn’t suspect that after about ten hours, you’ll have already finished it… The anxiety and suspense are such that you’re simply forced to dive into this tragic story. To follow Cynthia in her investigation and finally see the unexpected outcome. You imagine everything except the truth, you suppose, you think you know but you’re wrong.
Linwood Barclay’s writing is meticulous, precise, never sloppy. He breathes life into all his characters, whom you end up knowing and understanding. You become attached very naturally, and this goes for both the main characters—Cynthia, Terry, Grace, Tess—and the secondary characters—Vince, Jane, Rolly.
The story is narrated in the first person, told by Cynthia’s husband, a choice initially surprising. But it fits perfectly with the rest of the plot and becomes very natural. Terry is an external observer, wanting to support and believe his wife but ultimately doubting her words and seeming lost with the paranoia emerging from Cynthia. He becomes one with the reader, questioning alongside them. Is it Cynthia who placed the hat on the kitchen table? Does the brown car really exist?
The author skillfully plays on these questions to bring the story to its conclusion in this book, which is both a thriller and a psychological novel.
“That Night” is a well-crafted novel with developed, interesting characters whose psychology is detailed; the book is gripping, the plot flawless. If you love suspense and aren’t afraid of an all-nighter, “That Night” is a must-read!
