The Dark Room by Sam Blake
Hare's Landing, West Cork. A house full of mystery...
Rachel Lambert leaves London afraid for her personal safety and determined to uncover the truth behind the sudden death of a homeless man with links to a country house hotel called Hare's Landing.
New York-based crime reporter Caroline Kelly's career is threatened by a lawsuit and she needs some thinking space away from her job. But almost as soon as she arrives, Hare's Landing begins to reveal its own stories - a 30-year-old missing person's case and the mysterious death of the hotel's former owner.
As Rachel and Caroline join forces, it becomes clear that their investigations are intertwined - and that there is nothing more dangerous than the truth..
Author Bio:
Sam Blake is a pseudonym for Vanessa Fox O'Loughlin, the founder of The Inkwell Group publishing consultancy and the hugely popular national writing resources website Writing.ie. She is Ireland's leading literary scout and has assisted many award-winning and bestselling authors to publication. As Sam Blake, she has written four previous novels and has topped the Irish bestseller chart.
Review
‘The Dark Room’ is an enticing and thrilling look at the secrets that houses can hide. Hare’s Landing is one of those houses, it’s filled with history and furniture and art that tell an intriguing tale of the past owners. The house and estate is now trading as a hotel and both Rachel and Caroline find themselves there as they all begin to unravel. This is a twisty tale of family history, unrequited love and missing person’s. It had me hooked from the first couple of chapter’s and I could not put it down - AT ALL!
Rachel end up at Hare’s Landing after her house is broken into and her boyfriend Hunter is knocked down and injured all in one day. Hunter has been filming a documentary on the homeless in London and has become close to a homeless man called Alfie Bows. Unfortunately, he has gone missing and Hunter thinks it could be all related and finds a mention of Hare’s Landing so send Rachel and their German Shephard, Jasper, over to Ireland to investigate.
Caroline is a top journalist in New York and has been suspended due to a complaint and decided to take two weeks vacation and goes to the furthest place she can think of and ends up at Hare’s Landing! The two girls end up teaming up to investigate and begin to think that the house has lots of secrets to give up! Caroline also thinks the house is haunted and feels a bit threatened by it.
To be honest I was more captivated by the story of Alfie Bows, the homeless man who plays the violin to an exceptional standard, seems to be well educated but ended up on the streets. Hunter was determined to find out why he ended up on the streets. I think I resonated with this part of the book as I am aware that there are so many reasons that homelessness can occur and I thought it was an excellent issue to highlight. I also loved Jasper the dog - who doesn’t love a dog that really turns into a character of its own?!
I really enjoyed this book. It had mystery, history, historic houses, twists after twists, was empathetic and had great characters. It was paced a little weirdly. I felt the first section could have been a bit quicker but the second half of the boom definitely picked up the pace and the revelation kept on coming! I thoroughly recommend this book. Let me know if you have read and your thoughts on it. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Review!
