Dead Reckoning
by Lea O'Harra
GENRE: thriller
PUBLICATION DATE: 09/29/2022
DESCRIPTION:
It’s a hot summer’s day in 1984 when twelve-year-old Gilly and her friend Sally find a dead baby girl in a shoebox hidden in the tall grass of the cemetery of their tiny town. Deciding to keep their discovery a secret, they bury the body in Gilly’s yard, with disastrous results. Babies in their strollers are interfered with. Two local children disappear and end up dead. A suspect is arrested and confesses, blaming his crimes on Gilly and Sally for having taken the dead baby. Gilly grows up, haunted by what’s happened. As a young woman, she flees the town and the bad memories it holds for her, going all the way to Japan. Returning with her husband as a woman in her late thirties to attend her mother’s funeral, Gilly finds that the past is not past. She’s threatened. Somebody is putting flowers on babies in their strollers again. When another child is abducted, Gilly knows she must discover the truth of what really happened all those years ago before more lives are lost.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Lea O’Harra has published three crime fiction novels set in rural modern-day Japan: Imperfect Strangers (2015); Progeny (2016); and Lady First (2017). These comprise the so-called ‘Inspector Inoue Murder Mystery’ series originally published by Endeavour Press (UK). Lady First was a finalist in the Beverly Hills Book Awards in 2017 as well as in the National Indie Excellence Awards in 2018. She also had a story included in Best Asian Crime Fiction published by Kitaab Press (Singapore) in 2020. In the spring of 2022 Sharpe Books (UK) reissued the Inoue mystery series and, in September 2022, published Lea O’Harra’s fourth novel, Dead Reckoning, a stand-alone set in her tiny hometown in the American Midwest. Here is the link to her website: http://leaoharra.com/
REVIEWS:
Suzanne Kamata's review: O'Harra perfectly captures the smalltown vibe. Everybody knows each other. The adults have jobs working in the tractor factory or selling cars. Most of Gillian's school friends, including Sally, have never left; they have married each other and settled in place. Gillian, who answered to the nickname "Mouse" as a child, turns out to have been the most adventurous of them all.
As the present story unfurls, Gillian appears more and more unreliable. She drinks so much that she passes out on the floor of a convenience store. Her fastidious brother Nick worries that she may turn out to be like their ditzy mother. Meanwhile, the locals wonder if she is somehow responsible when sinister things start to happen again.
Taut and tense throughout, the story builds to an explosive climax. This nail-biter will make readers want to lock their doors and close their curtains -- and stay out of the woods!
COMPARATIVE FILM/BOOK:
'Dead Reckoning" has been compared to the 1980s Netflix series "Stranger Things" and the movie version of Grady Hendrix's "My Best Friend's Exorcism." While neither supernatural nor a horror story, "Dead Reckoning" also features kids roaming free with little adult supervision, going into the woods, riding bikes and making secret hideouts.
CASTING:
Gilly Kataoka: Millie Bobby Brown; Sally Pawlowski: Sadie Sink; Tim Collins: Joe Keery
PRIMARY VENUES/LOCATIONS WITHIN THE BOOK:
a small town, population approximately 500, in the American Midwest
BOOK EXCERPT:
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