SINGULARITY'S POINT
The Words, Wisdom and Weirdness of Shaun Allan - Author
BLACK THICKETT
Grief is a ghost that only time can exorcise. But some wounds run too deep for even time to heal.
Edmund comes to the remote village of Black Thickett to escape the life that grief has carved out of him. He wants silence. Distance. A place where memories can’t follow.
But Black Thickett is wrong in quiet, unsettling ways.
The broken road becomes perfectly smooth the moment he crosses the boundary. The cottages are too neat, too deliberate. And on a noticeboard full of dry flyers, only one poster is wet - a missing boy, smiling as if he doesn’t know he’s lost.
The villagers won’t talk about the disappearances. Instead, they whisper warnings about the dark treeline looming over the square.
The forest at the edge of the village seems to breathe, and the deeper Edmund goes, the calmer he feels… dangerously so. The woods can quiet his pain. It can ease his grief. It can make him forget the agony of his past.
But the peace of the forest comes with a terrible price. Not everything that heals you wants you to survive.
Welcome to Black Thickett. Once the forest notices you, it never lets go.
This was such a creepy and eerie book to read. The building of tension was executed so well. It was a slow-paced book but it needed to be to build up that unsettling feeling and let the themes of the story take root (yes, a pun).
The start of every chapter had a beautiful, almost lyrical opening, picking apart and examining grief and human behaviour.
There was a reprise - which I'm not sure I've seen in a book before, like a post-credits scene - which came after the epilogue and tipped everything on its head so I'm now turning over everything in my mind, wondering what I just read!"
"I loved the personification throughout and really could feel it breathing and slithering around as I became more and more immersed in the read."
"I had goosebumps while reading it."
"A book that’s spooky and atmospheric but more than that it’s also brings in folklore around grief and loss, that chills and causes breath holding moments."
EXCERPTS
Grief is a ghost that only time can exorcise.
Though Life has a hand in manipulating the heart in an effort to ease the effects of loss, the results can be mediocre at best. Work and play might pull at the mind’s hand, dragging it away from memories that refuse silence, but rest swats them away. All that remains when distractions take a breath, are tears.
Only Time has the power to heal the wounds grief carves into us. Only Time has the ability to smother them with a pillow of years, pressing down until they suffocate and cease to be. Until they fade. Or hide.
Air. A mad mix of gases thrown together, allowing us life. The invisible combination just right, just perfect for us to survive. To thrive.
Yet…
The moment the root tore through the ceiling, the air inside the Black Swann changed. It thickened - visibly, impossibly - gathering in the space above Edmund like a storm cloud forming a single, purposeful shape.
Malcolm roared something, though Edmund couldn’t parse the words, before swinging the poker again. There was an audible screech, coming from above, and the root jerked back. Except, this one didn’t retreat far. It lingered just above the broken rafters, wavering, tasting the air.
Something in Edmund surged up his throat.
“It’s… calling me.”
The slack handful of patrons looked up sharply as the Black Swann’s door slammed behind Edmund. Even he was alarmed by the unintended force. Windows were rattled and dozing dust motes were startled into a spiralling dance. Every person’s face carried the same heavy expression. Tight, wary exhaustion. A fear they no longer had the energy to disguise.
The landlord placed the glass he was polishing down and flipped the cloth over his shoulder. He stepped from behind the bar, his eyes widening at the sight of Edmund.
“What happened?” he demanded. “You look like you’ve run through Hell itself.”
Edmund’s mouth opened and closed wordlessly. The words didn’t know which way to go to be heard.
His chest still throbbed. It was slow and it was knowing.