THE BONE MOTHER by Suzy Aspley
‘Out here we honour our Bone Mother, or pay the price.’
Investigative journalist Martha Strangeways made her debut in the excellent novel CROW MOON. Shaped by extreme family trauma and driven by an overriding passion for the truth and for justice, Martha was utterly irresistible.
I was, therefore, delighted to learn that Suzy Aspley had plans to continue Martha’s story and even more delighted to read the second in what I hope will become a long series of novels.
THE BONE MOTHER marks a triumphant return for both novelist and protagonist. This is folk horror inflected crime fiction of the highest order. Unease and dread pervade the novel as a young woman, seeking the Cailleach’s shrine (a place of worship in the name of the Celtic God), is found ritualistically mutilated and murdered.
With potent effect, Aspley evokes all of the links in Adam Scovell’s folk horror ‘chain’: a deep connection with the landscape, isolated settings, skewed belief systems that clash with modernity, and a dreadful summoning/happening. The novel is lyrically beautiful, at times dreamlike and ethereal, at times a pulsating thriller, but always unputdownable. The novel’s whole is so much more than the sum of its parts.
Now we need Martha Strangeways Book 3, please and thank you.
I’ll be chatting to Suzy about her work, alongside Carol Pouliot and Marsali Taylor, at this year’s Shetland Noir. We’ll be discussing ‘fantastical crime’. I could not be happier! We may have more to talk about than can be accommodated within the allotted hour…
#TheBoneMother @OrendaBooks @writer_suzy @CarolPouliot #MarsaliTaylor