My third foray into Camilla Bruce’s works proved to be quite different from the previous experiences, which were novels based on historical figures of serial killers on which the author had construed a partly imagined story. You Let Me In is quite different instead, being based on totally fictional characters, and in particular that of Cassie Tipp, a successful novelist with an obscure past: the book starts a year after her mysterious disappearance, as her niece Penelope and nephew Janus visit their aunt’s home with the instruction to read her last manuscript, at the end of which they will find the key to retrieve Cassie’s considerable inheritance.

The manuscript is addressed directly to Penelope and Janus and tells Cassie’s life-story, or at least the woman’s version of it, since it becomes apparent after a while that she might be an unreliable narrator: always something of an outsider in her own family, Cassandra grew up isolated from her judgmental mother and picture perfect younger sister, from an indifferent father and absentee brother; her only constant companion was Pepper Man, a creature only she could see and who created a predatory relationship with her, drinking Cassie’s blood like a vampire.

Later on, as the relationship between Cassie and Pepper Man moves toward sexual intimacy, he introduces her to his faerie domain, peopled by weird and terrifying creatures in whose company Cassie feels more at ease than with true human beings. Even her courtship and marriage with a local boy is tampered with by the intrusion of these otherworldly beings, to the point that his gruesome death lays heavy shadows on Cassie who is suspected of his murder. And that’s not the only dubious occurrence, because a few years later Cassie’s father and brother die in what looks like a murder-suicide, but also presents some bizarre details that once again shine some unwelcome light on her person.

All of the above, of course, comes from Cassie’s perspective, because readers are also made aware of a psychiatrist’s evaluation which labels her outlandish stories as a way to cope with domestic abuse, processing this trauma through the lens of the fantasies that to Cassie have become a world within the real one - a version that Cassie constantly repudiates as a flight of fancy on the doctor’s part. And here stands the true mystery of this story, because both versions could be true, and both versions speak of a life-long ordeal in which the victim, Cassie, has found a way to structure her suffering into a creation where, in the end, she accepts everything as “normal” and even finds a modicum of happiness, twisted as it might be: the sections where she speaks of her relationship with Pepper Man as a loving one, where she says that he does indeed love her, are among the more chillingly disturbing of the whole book.

That Cassie is a victim, and has been for most of her life, is without doubt, because no matter what version of the story you believe - that of the blood-sucking Pepper Man and his cadre of supernatural beings, or that of the dysfunctional family in which she was always an outsider and the victim of abuse, physical and verbal - it could be argued that she shows definite symptoms of Stockholm’s Syndrome and of a coping mechanism that makes her accept the horrors of such a life as something “normal”, and in some instance even acceptable. The distinction between what’s real and what’s imagined is made even more difficult, if not impossible, by a total lack of an outside point of view: every detail, every occurrence is always mediated through Cassie’s perspective, even Dr. Martin’s evaluation, so that the readers find themselves in the impossibility to verify the facts as presented.

No matter what side of the story one might believe in, Cassie’s journey remains a fascinatingly compelling one: Camilla Bruce has a way of drawing her readers in and keep them grimly fascinated as they try to perceive the truth of the situation which must lie between the line, but remains elusive throughout the whole length of the book. Even the end manages to keep the mystery alive because the final surprise that Cassie springs on her heirs is one that leaves the door open to interpretation, shrouding it in one of those faerie arrangements that showcase the cruelly duplicitous nature of those creatures - provided that they exist, of course…

It was a final twist I did not expect and that left me both shocked and admiring of the subtle tapestry that the author has woven with this story, one that I find difficult to forget. ( )

Sad to say I have abandoned this one. I just couldn’t get into PepperMan or continue to try to keep the thread of this story alive for me. ( )

I can't remember why I put this book on hold at the library. It seemed like a fairly ordinary thriller, reading the description nothing really stood out. How wrong I was.

You Let Me In is about Cassandra Tipp, a romance author disappeared a year ago. She has left everything in her estate to her niece and nephew, provided they read her final manuscript and give her solicitor the code word buried within.

The manuscript is the story of her life; Cassandra's childhood, the dismissive cruelty of her mother and sister, her husband's gruesome death, and the murder-suicide of her father and brother. Cassandra's narration is unreliable, her perspective shifting often, and as the reader, you're pulled along, debating what is true and what isn't throughout. Just when you think you've figured it out, you're sure, a niggling little doubt appears in your mind.

This was hard to write without giving anything away. I just really enjoyed the story. ( )

Wow, not what I was expecting AT ALL. If someone were to describe this book to me, I probably wouldn't have read it. I'm glad I picked it up without knowing much about it because I was hooked from page one and couldn't put it down.

I reviewed it on Criminal Element: https://www.criminalelement.com/book-review-you-let-me-in-by-camilla-bruce/ ( )

When a popular novelist disappears and is presumed dead, her estate passes to her niece and nephew - if they will first submit to hearing her version of the bloodsoaked events that split the family. Expect an unreliable narrator and an ambiguous tale that leaves the reader to decide what truth to embrace. Not quite what I expected, this excellent debut is a particularly disturbing take on fairies and a thorny family history of abuse.

Brilliantly done, deeply uncomfortable.

Full review ( )