One book down, seven more to go
This first venture in an eight part series is a winner
Imagine sharing your dreams, desires and even memories with an identical twin brother you don’t even know you have — a twin who also happens to be a psychopath.
That’s the premise behind Blue Monday, the first of what promises to be an excellent, eight-part series by the husband-and-wife writing team of Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, known collectively as Nicci French.
This psychological thriller/crime novel, set in London, is a well-paced, wellwritten and addictive read. Therapist Frieda Klein, the central figure, is an intriguing and complex character. Gerrard and French carefully allude to an estrangement from her family, and a dark past that drives her to cocoon in her small apartment and roam London during sleepless nights. It is Frieda who gradually unravels the mystery at the heart of the story, without revealing any of her own secrets.
Blue Monday begins with the disappearance of a five-year-old girl named Joanna, more than two decades before the central events of the remainder of the novel. When a little boy is abducted 22 years later, and one of Frieda’s patients shares his dreams of a red-headed lad who matches the missing boy’s description, Klein begins to get uneasy. She struggles with her desire not to violate a patient’s confidence over something that seems too unsubstantial — a dream — but eventually turns to Detective Chief Inspector Malcolm Karlsson.
When Karlsson clears Alan Dekker, Frieda’s patient, the case seems stalled. But then Karlsson asks Frieda to try to retrieve the memories from a witness to the first abduction. And Dekker is kissed by a woman who has evidently mistaken him for someone else. That’s when some detective work on the part of Klein and the student she is supervising reveal the existence of Dekker’s twin.
The eerie similarities of the separated twins at the heart of Blue Monday are rooted in reality. Studies of identical twins raised separately have revealed shared mannerisms, hobbies, occupations and life choices. Researchers even report that separated twins suffered headaches at the same time of day, have married wives with the same first names and even gave their sons the same middle name (different spelling, though). It’s no wonder the phenomenon sparked French and Gerrard’s imagination. They make the premise work, with only occasional cracks in its credibility.
If a series is to be successful, the author has to not only grip readers with the first plot, but create memorable characters that warrant repeated encounters. French and Gerrard have succeeded not only with Frieda Klein, but with the cast of supporting characters introduced in
Blue Monday. There is Karlsson — slightly clichéd as the hardworking divorced cop — and the more interesting Josef, a Ukrainian builder who falls through the ceiling of Frieda’s office, and into her life. Frieda`s former mentor, Reuben, and her sister-in-law Olivia and niece Chloe also promise to inspire pivotal events in future books.
It would be tempting for Gerrard and French to bring Karlsson and Frieda together in a romantic pairing — but hopefully they will resist. It’s refreshing to read a drama this good that does not follow well-trodden paths.
Gerrard and French have proven they can hold a reader’s interest throughout a suspenseful and thoughtful novel. But they also demand that their readers pay attention. The chilling twist right at the end of the novel could almost slip by, since the essential elements of the story seem wrapped up by that point, if that attention wandered.
The writing team’s biggest challenge will be ensuring that their second novel in the series, due out later this year, lives up to the high standards and expectations they have set in Blue Monday.
Laura Eggertson is an Ottawa-based freelance journalist.