The book that will keep you up all night.

By SARAH-JANE COLLINS

I don’t remember when it started, but for as long as I can remember I’ve harboured an irrational fear of lakes and rivers. Not water, not the ocean, but the cold, still, murky depths of lakes and rivers. I’m fine in the shallows, but once I can’t feel or see the bottom I freak out a little. I’m a strong swimmer, a former rower – exactly the kind of person you’d think could care less about how deep a lake is. I just can’t shake the feeling when I’m out there that I’m not alone.

This water has secrets, I usually think.

That is certainly true of the lake in British-Australian author Hannah Richell’s second novel, The Shadow Year, which is released this month.

The Shadow Year is an ambitious book, with overt Shakespearian themes – love, betrayal, power, jealousy. From the prologue alone – a woman, alone in a lake, suspended in the water, you can see his guiding influence.

The Shadow Year deals with parallel stories, staged some 30 years apart, which clearly must converge at some point.

The first involves a young woman, who is mysteriously bequeathed a run-down country cottage by a lake.

Lila is grief-stricken following an accident. Her marriage, and life as she knows it is just one wrong step away from falling apart.

The second narrative, set in 1980, involves a group of university housemates about to graduate who set out in search of a cool spot on a hot day. They discover a rundown cottage by a stunning, secluded lake and decide on a whim to live there for a year.

It is clear from the beginning that the two stories involve the same cottage, but not necessarily how they intersect. Richell deliberately avoids giving away too much too early, in case we piece the thing together. Instead we switch back and forth, from Lila to the young graduates, Kat, Simon, Ben, Carla and Mac, one month unfolding at a time.

Richell does a fine job of evoking the English countryside. It is easy to imagine the place, its smells and sights.

The 1980 narrative is told from the point of view of Kat.

It is mysterious enough to keep you engaged, but drops enough crumbs along the way that the twists and turns aren’t wholly unexpected.

Richell is a lovely writer. She keeps a good pace, and manages the shift from one story to the other without too much upheaval. This book is easy to devour quickly – I read it in just one night – despite its length. It is entertaining and intriguing.

It is a book about loss, vanity, selfishness, fear, intimacy and coming of age. The Shadow Year will draw you in, and hold onto you until it’s done. There are some beautifully constructed moments, alongside some overly melodramatic ones.

I liked The Shadow Year a lot and next on my reading list is Richell’s first novel Secrets of the Tides.

However, this book has done nothing to dispel my fear of lakes. Yes, there are always secrets below the surface.

The new novel from the author of the best-selling SECRETS OF THE TIDES, THE SHADOW YEAR is a captivating story of secrets, tragedy, lies and betrayal.

On a sultry summer’s day in 1980, five friends stumble upon an abandoned lakeside cottage in the English countryside. But when a visitor appears at their door, nothing will be the same again …

Three decades later, Lila arrives at the cottage with her marriage in crisis. She finds solace in renovating the tumbledown house, but she wonders about the previous inhabitants. Why did they leave in such a hurry?  And why can’t she shake the feeling that someone is watching her?

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