Every Contact Leaves A Trace
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4.0 • 12 Ratings
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- £7.99
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- £7.99
Publisher Description
'If you were to ask me to tell you about my wife, I would have to warn you at the outset that I don't know a great deal about her. Or at least, not as much as I thought I did...'
Alex is a solitary London lawyer who is deeply in love with his beautiful wife, Rachel. When Rachel is brutally murdered one Midsummer Night in Oxford, all of his happiness vanishes. Shrouded in shock and grief, he returns to Oxford that winter and begins to try to piece together the mystery surrounding Rachel’s death, discovering in her wake a tangled web of sex and jealousy, of would-be lovers and spiteful friends, of blackmail, and of revenge.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Part meditation on grief and memory, part literary thriller, Dymott's complex debut is thoughtful and rich in mood. London attorney Alex Peterson is mourning the loss of his wife Rachel, killed six months ago during a visit to the Oxford college where they met as students. The combination of the depth of his sadness and his legal mind draws him into the questions surrounding her unsolved murder, so when he is contacted by Rachel's former English professor, Harry, who they were visiting the night of her death, Alex thinks the prof might have some answers. Harry relates a long and meandering tale about Rachel's relationships with her two closest college friends and her guardian, and his own complicity in her death. Alex uses that information to piece together an explanation that reveals the slippery nature of truth and memory. Dymott's tale is disappointing as often as it is engaging, hampered by Alex's bland narration and too many levels of mediation, and by a slim, questionable story, but patient and forgiving readers of Gone Girl and The Secret History will be drawn in by its contemplation.
