Voices in an Empty House
Joan Aiken
17 May 2018
9781509878666Synopsis
“Gabriel!” But calling was pointless, and he stopped at once, embarrassed by the sound of his voice . . . Nobody was here in the small apartment, nobody but himself.
Lonely sixteen-year-old Gabriel, son of a Nobel Prize winner, has gone missing, and with a life-threatening heart condition his family are desperate to find him before it’s too late. Amnesia-stricken stepdad Thomas, spiteful mother Bella, and her sardonic twin brother Bo, all have their own selfish reasons to pursue him to Greenwich Village, New York where he was last seen.
But Gabriel doesn’t want to be found . . .
Jumping between each character’s perspective over the course of seven years, awardwinning author Joan Aiken expertly pieces together a complex and dynamic family history that leads to every parent’s nightmare in her modern suspense novel, Voices in an Empty House.
Aiken handles intricate entanglements with skill, juggling flashbacks like oranges without ever dropping onePsychology Today
This enthralling book is much more than a thriller . . . Joan Aiken has built up a novel both witty and moving around the complex relationships of an extraordinary family that are both indelible and disquieting. Compulsively readableSelina Hastings, Guardian Book of the Week
Voices in an Empty House is a cat’s cradle of interwoven destinies and uncanny coincidences. Bella and Bo, evil twins, create untold damage with their moral rampages; on the side of the angels are Bella’s husband Thomas and son Gabriel. As a study of good routing evil it makes satisfactory reading for a stormy nightSunday Times
