THE COTTINGLEY CUCKOO

RELEASED OUT NOW! 368 pages | Paperback/ebook

Author AJ Elwood

Publisher Titan Books

Say the word “fairy” and there are two possible images that arise: the beautiful flower folk, as pictured in famous hoax the Cottingley fairies, and also an older, darker kind – the kind that sour your milk and steal your children. Which is more likely? And, of course, are fairies real at all?

That last point is the killer one in this lacklustre novel, which tells the story of Rose, a young woman back from university who takes work at a care home to make ends meet. She’s introduced to Charlotte Favell, a meanspirited resident who slowly allows Rose to read her collection of letters, written in the 1920s by an elderly Cottingley man, describing the fairies who come to torment his family. When Rose finds out she’s pregnant she becomes ever more obsessed with the unfolding story, and with Mrs Favell’s true nature.

There are some promising ideas that are under-explored in this dark fairy tale, which is occasionally tense but never gripping. It’s too easy to lose patience with Rose, a character whose thwarted dreams should make her sympathetic, while the Cottingley letters themselves are never as intriguing for the reader as they are for Rose. And while the set-up should feel unsettling, it sadly doesn’t ever quite convince.

Rhian Drinkwater