This is so good that when I picked it up to check if I read it last year, I ended up reading it again.
‘This’ is ‘The Unremarkable Heart’, a short story by well-established crime writer Karin Slaughter, and, yes, that is her birth name. (She has said previously that it’s a good thing she didn’t want to write romances.)
What’s it about?
June Connors is dying of cancer. Today. As her body begins to shut down, her attentive husband lingers nearby and her thoughts skate over their history together, including the fate of their fifteen year old daughter. June would like to die while focusing on her happy memories, but she’s aware there’s a question she’s never asked and that now is her final opportunity…
What’s it like?
Excellent. Chilling. Gripping. Completely convincing. June Connors seems to be her own worst enemy as she insists on spending her dying months working at a job she has grown to hate.
‘She wanted them to see her face every day, to watch the slow decline, to note the subtle changes that marked her impending death. Her last pound of flesh. Her last attempt to show them that they were not the only ones who sustained damage. Jesus on the cross had made a less determined departure.’
She is a wonderfully real character whose impending death has evidently not softened the frustrations created by a lifetime of teaching teenagers English!
”Metastases,’ June had corrected [the doctor], thinking she could not even have the luxury of dying without having to correct the English of someone who should clearly know better.’
As the story develops, we see how June’s lonely, bitter end became an inevitability and can only gasp at the cruelty inflicted in her final moments.
Final thoughts
I enjoyed every part of this: the writing style, the characterisation, the unfurling of a dark and chilling storyline.
I thought I didn’t like Karin Slaughter’s writing, as I found ‘Faithless’ to be a bit soap-opera-ish, but now I’m tempted to give another one of her County Grant novels a try. Has anyone read them? Any recommendations for where to start? Or should I be heeding my memory, which tells me I was underwhelmed?