Book Review: "The Retreat" by Mark Edwards

Mark Edwards is a great writer of the thriller genre. Often winding multiple stories around each other, using misdirection to trick the reader and utilising the landscape in ways that other writers do not really do as well - his books are often a great blend of atmosphere and tension. I've read a few books by this author now and for some reason, I left too much time between my first read and my second. This book deals with a man who goes to stay at a writing retreat to work on his horror novel, but he might have just walked his way into a haunted house as things start to happen to him and the other residents. Not to mention, there's a woman who owns the house who once witnessed something terrible.

Our main character is a writer who is working on his next horror novel despite having little faith in himself. One of his books is being made into a film but is currently stuck in development hell and the other works of his as of yet, haven't sold very well. He takes a trip back to Wales where he grew up to attend a writing retreat for a while with a few other writers. The retreat is owned by a woman who has witnessed something absolutely horrifying. Some time ago, her husband drowned trying to save their daughter who was thought to have also drowned. Accepting that her husband drowned was simple but she is convinced that her daughter is still alive. Mark Edwards initially establishes her child disappearing and his writing of missing children-based horror novels as a horrid coincidence but as the novel progresses, he weaves them both together in a way in which of course the writer could help this woman with the loss of her child. The writing might come across as a bit matter-of-fact but it does add to the overall plot. The fact that our main character is a horror author as well makes for a very interesting perspective. It might not be as compelling as his other novels, but if you keep with it, it eventually starts to make sense. What you start to wonder is whether this is all actually happening as it is or whether our main character is adding his own perspective to it because of the fact he's a horror author.

As the story moves along, we also see the perspective of the daughter who went missing, but it's from 2014 when she turns eight. She gets a new bicycle and meets her best friend's grandfather who is a creepy and strange man who asks her a lot of very personal questions. She is also someone who is quite perceptive, she often sees her parents arguing quite a lot, worried that they could get divorced like her best friend's parents. She wouldn't like that. But then there's the folk legend of the 'Red Widow'. A character from legend who grabs children and kidnaps them, something of a 'Woman in Black' kind of character. We learn that many years before this daughter went missing, another girl also went missing in a similar way. What this starts to become is something of a cat-and-mouse game and, in the present, our horror author hires a private investigator to try and help the homeowner come to some sort of closure about her daughter. Though, everyone is rather tight-lipped - ultimately leading the private investigator to get spooked and flee the town. Something was not right of course, something was very rotten.

Images of dead birds, singing of welsh folk songs in the silence and nothingness and celebrating a birthday of a child who may no longer exist litter the book with unsettling natures. It definitely feels like a cross between a thriller and a folk horror. The only thing I would say is a slight downside is there are a few too many characters though, that's my only real gripe. It is atmospheric and often terrifying, eerie and often quiet and rural with a strange supernatural quality. But as our horror author states: there must be a rational explanation for things, this cannot be all there is. Or could it be something else entirely?

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