Frances Fyfield

A satisfying, morally ambiguous twist on the familiar old serial killer theme, which manages to go the full nine tailors whilst still feeding us enough red herrings to get the fishing fleet safely through Brexit. And manages to turn South Devon into nightmare country...

As ever, I found it a bit hard to warm to Fyfield's characters, but the plotting is clever and keeps you guessing, mostly without the use of any obvious bamboozling devices.

I read this book as an electronic advance reading copy (e-ARC) provided by Edelweiss, and I have submitted my comments to the publisher via that web site.

This book was well written yet very difficult to read, primarily because of the subject matter. Everyone in the book behaves badly, full of misconceptions, miscommunications, and selfish motives. I believe the author constructed this story as a cautionary tale to show how easily sociopaths can succeed in a world where people believe what is show more convenient and easy without delving further to uncover the ugly truth about each other. Abuse and neglect quickly--and inexorably--lead to the ultimate horror of murder. Redemption arrives too late, and it is uncertain and imperfect. The story ends as unhappily as it began.

I hesitate to recommend this book, especially to anyone who has survived abuse from a parent or domestic partner. (And if you like cats, you will be sickened, too.) Many scenes could be triggering to vulnerable readers--but perhaps that is what the author wants. We should always be shocked and saddened to learn about cruelty and abuse. We cease to be human if we become inured to these horrors. show less

BLOOD FROM STONE is the story of a repugnant man, his equally repugnant lawyer and the people whose lives the pair impact. In a non-linear (but very readable) way a story of domestic horror unfolds in which Rick Boyd has caused such physical and psychological harm to his partner that she must be rescued by her sister and is eventually charged (I was never sure what with…rape? assault? kidnapping?). He is ably – too ably – represented by Marianne Shearer, a lawyer so determined to win show more that she welcomes the opportunity to bully and demean anyone who gets in her way. Soon after her win (and this is not a spoiler as it happens in the opening pages of the book) Marianne falls from the window of a London hotel and dies. There appears to be little doubt it was suicide but for the fact that Marianne seems the unlikliest of people to take such an action.

It’s a couple of days since I finished this book and I’m still not sure how I feel about it: It did make for compelling reading (or listening in my case) but there are some things about it that don’t quite gel. And then there’s the whole ‘the justice system is broken’ thing that can be guaranteed to make me squirm, though to be fair to the author that’s a reality that I can’t blame her for.

Fyfield has used a combination of trial transcript extracts and narrative sequences from several different points of view to reveal this complex story and she juggles all of these elements with aplomb. A less assured author would have left the reader floundering with the rapid changes. And the story itself is largely believable,slowly revealing all the tiny factors that led to the horrific outcome for so many people. The fact that the so-called justice system fails miserably in failing to convict Rick Boyd due solely to the shenanigans of his high-priced lawyer rather than points of law is, also, believable in the context that Fyfield creates (though if I’m honest she didn’t have to do a lot of convincing in my case).

Where the novel wasn’t quite as successful for me was in the characterisations and this is only partly due to the fact that most of the people we meet (even the good guys) aren’t terribly likable. Rick Boyd’s brand of repugnant psychopathy is credible enough to start with – plenty of people manipulate those around them and take advantage of people’s weaknesses – but the speed with which he seems to be able to bend people to his will became incredible to me when he met his lawyer’s brother (and sole heir) after her death. Marianne too doesn’t quite ring true. Frankly I doubt you could be a successful lawyer using the sort of appalling language and harassment she supposedly uses in the courtroom and I found the coincidence that led to her change of heart awkward and unconvincing (and unnecessary, the change of heart could have happened without this particular layer) (and yes I realise that sentence is a bit obtuse but I don’t want to give away any spoilers).

On the other hand I thought Fyfield was successful in depicting a person with two personas very different from each other, as perhaps many of us are. We discover that when not being a ruthless lawyer Marianne is a lover of vintage designer clothes and that her main intimate relationship is with a man who shares this love of fine things and the pair have created man rituals around this interest. The person who discovers this is Hen Joyce, sister of the woman who Rick Boyd assaulted and herself a lover of vintage clothing (in fact she works as restorer of them), and for me she is the most successful characterisation of the novel. Her internal conflict over what has happened to her sister and whether she stepped in at the right time seemed very natural, as did her confusion over how to respond to what she learns about Marianne’s personality after her death (versus what learned of it when being questioned by her as part of the trial).

In the end I would recommend the novel (and as it won the 2008 CWA Duncan Lawrie Award for best crime novel of the year) as I thought the structure and plot construction first rate and some elements of the character development were also well done. Well worth a read if you like novels which tease out psychological themes and make the reader work a little (or wait a while) for such satisfactory justice as they’ll be allowed. show less

‘But surely you know in that situation that you don’t have control’. We were talking about abusive relationships this morning and Anna didn’t get it. But Anna, my dear. The whole point of abusive relationships is that the abuser leaves you with this sense, just this sense that you do have some control. That if you do this, or don’t do that, or keep your desk neat, or cook this not that, then everything will be okay. They are nice to you sometimes, of course. Same thing. They need show more you to see that nice is possible, see what things are like if you do the right thing? Then I’m nice. They need to leave you with a modicum of self-respect because if you do hit absolute rock bottom, actually they have nothing with which to control you any more.

It’s on my mind to get this down now that I’ve spent a couple of hours talking about it, so I tell you a bit of my story because you can only sound half-convincing if you have ‘I’s in it.

Mid nineties. I’ve been living with the person in question for about nine years and I read this book, this one here, The Playroom. Probably Manny and Jordan would call it trash? I haven’t come to understand that term properly yet, but at any rate, it changed my life. All of a sudden I read a sentence that made my heart that very second drop out of my body through the chair, the floor, the earth and plummet right to the bottom side of the world somewhere. Oh. I’m in a straightforward abusive relationship.

Now, I would say I’m not completely dumb. Well, sort of dumb. I can’t imagine passing an IQ test. I’ve flunked shapes in holes since kindergarten, with the possible exception of sex. I say possible because it continues to startle me. ‘We’re going to put that in this?’ ‘You’re telling me this fits there?!!!’ As an act of faith, of course, faith in the practically infinite number of people who have done these things thus permitting the conclusion that the shapes do apparently fit in the holes I go along with it, but there is always a sense of surprise nonetheless. After sex I always feel a bit like going back to kindergarten and trying that thing they make you do with the cutout holes and the pieces you fit in the holes. I have an idea maybe I could do that after all. The feeling passes quickly enough.

So, dumb, certainly. The fact is I’d lived in this relationship for nine years and for about eight and a half of them I’d observed to myself that this was like an abusive relationshop. ‘Like’. Always ‘like’. Not for one second did it occur to me to take out that word. One might say I had particular reasons for being this dense. He was an alcoholic and that served as cover. Then when, most terribly, he gave up alcohol altogether I had what seemed a really rational idea that I was bearing the brunt of his difficult transition to relating with people sober and that things would change. There was always a reason to leave ‘like’ there. I’m sure there are always reasons for other people too. She’s (he’s) just jealous, just needs things to be neat, just this, just that. He’s (she’s) nice, really. And can’t you see things are better than they used to be? Look. As long as I do this then...or if I don't talk...or if I don't look....or when...then as long as...everything is okay. Really. Then everything is okay.

But then I read this book, read this sentence, read on and it might just as well have been my own life I was reading. I was so shocked that I hid the book after I’d read it. I guess he sensed that, sought out the book and read it. ‘That’s just like us,’ he said. With a sense of relief, it seemed obvious to me that if that was the case, that we both knew what things were like and we weren’t idiots that things would change, but they didn’t. Not one bit.

Attempt number one to get away was a dismal failure. When I went back I thought I’d die. But in fact I got a better plan together and attempt number two worked a treat.

What you understand, though, as a complete revelation if you are lucky, is that you have no control. You only thought you did. Once you realise that, then you can escape. I didn’t have anybody I was talking to, nobody pointed out the terribly obvious to me, but even if they had, I’m sure it wouldn’t have helped. You could have any number of people who love you telling you you are trapped in an abusive relationship, it really won’t help. It will come to you as your own revelation or it won’t. Those who watch you lovingly from a distance and see, can only hope for the best. That is my experience. But, then, I’m not good at accepting help. A more sensible person might – and did…

Later on after I’d escaped that person, he moved to the UK and an awfully bright but fucked up girl fell in love with him. I wanted to warn her off, but what’s the point of that? Like she was going to listen to me! But five years or so later, I knew she’d tried to get away now and then and failed. I decided to contact her like this. I wrote her an email describing in intimate detail her days, her life, conversations she had every day and ways she had of relating to the person she was trying to escape. I told her I could explain to her what she had to do to get away if she wanted. She wrote back a couple of days later, she said after she’d stopped crying and yes, she did want to know.

In one brutal email, this girl had discovered that she had no control over her life whatsoever. She had so little control that a stranger on the other side of the world who had never met her, knew everything about her life simply because I knew her life would be exactly like mine.

In a strange way we’d both realised what our situations were by reading about them. It took me two tries and a couple of years to get away. This girl was a good listener. She took everything I said to heart, did exactly what I said and got clean away before her partner could blink. It was clean, she never went back.

Admitting you do not have control over your life is a really painful thing to do. Understanding that even if you love a person and even if you think they love you, it doesn’t mean he/she isn’t an abuser, is very hard to come to terms with. I have no doubt that abusers love their victims and their victims love them. Still. Although there is good reason for the abuser to want the keep the relationship, the same does not pertain to the victim. They have nothing to gain whatsoever. They only think they do.

A bit later, I remember this. As you do take back your life and leave, he/she suggests they will kill you. Or, even harder from your point of view, kill themself. Again and again you are told you won't survive...and when that doesn't work, that she/he won't survive. You are made to feel weak and incapable on your own, or - desperation - that they are. One or other of you won't be able to function as a human being without the other. So you are made to feel.

When I left the first time, friends said to me, but how will he survive without you? When I went back I thought that's what want they all want, for me to die there. But, of course, they didn't know. Point is abusers are perfectly able to look weak if that is a useful thing to do. Second time around I just steeled myself. Ignored all those cries of sympathy for this person I was escaping. The friends all stayed true. You don't lose friends, you only fear that you will. show less