Folly

Very well done. Suspenseful without going for the cheap thrill. Romantic without mushy platitudes. During much of the narrative, nothing happens, but the story is interesting enough so that we want to get to know Rae through these moments. The use of great-uncle Desmond’s journal entries were very good, too, and illustrated parallels in her life as well as in the life of someone she doesn’t actually meet until the end of the story.

I loved the parts when she was building the house alone. When she was excavating the cellar and found all those artifacts and began to piece together Desmond’s stay on the island. Her love and devotion to the house’s restoration. The pleasure she took in her art and her craftsmanship show more (craftswomanship?). She sounds like a person I would like to know even though she doesn’t sound easy to get to know or like once you have. She’s abrupt and uncharitable sometimes. Kind of like me. show less

This should have been a boring book.

It is about one woman's fight to resume a normal life after several bouts of suicidal depression. Rae decides to rebuild the house which her great-uncle Desmond built on a small island off the north west coast of America.

The house had burnt down and Desmond had disappeared; now the island belonged to Rae.

Most of the book catalogues the slow clearing of the site and the rebuilding of the house, guided by a photograph taken 70 years before. But it also describes her relationship with others who come to the island; the sheriff and the wild-life warden, the prickly relationship with her daughter and her passionate desire to keep contact with her beloved grand-daughter, Petra.

Were the sounds which she show more heard and the feeling of being watched hallucinations or was someone really a danger to her? This is the story of a woman's determination to prove to herself and others that she is sane and able to fight her demons without the use of drugs; that she is not insane ...

It is not a boring book after all. King is able to balance the rather mundane description of the gradual growth of the house with the tension Rae feels as she comes to terms with the reality of what she finds on the island, not least her sanity. show less

I like Laurie R. King and her books, particularly the Mary Russell series. That said, [Folly] is my favorite by far and I read it, or listen to the audiobook, every couple of years. King paints a vivid, utterly believable story. I love the whole idea that the main character, Rae Newborn, has been to hell through grief and mental illness. She feels battered and tumbled and finally decides to make a stand. She sets off to rebuild a house on an island in the San Juan Straits. The novel is a story of reclamation on many levels. With King at the helm, the story takes interesting and suspenseful turns, and finally delivers a satisfying resolution to the plot line.

As well as writing two outstanding series, Laurie R. King writes some amazing stand alones, and this is one of them. Rae Newborn is putting the pieces of her life back together, or trying to, by going to an island in the San Juans of the Northwest and rebuilding the house which belonged to her great uncle.

That is the framework for the novel, but in many ways it is a study in connection, loyalty, family and the healing powers of art and creativity.

I am strenuously avoiding giving away much of anything of the plot, because any new reader deserves to have every little twist show up for them. It is a great treat of a book.

The suspense is so well done that I had to commit The Reader's Sin: I peeked at the ending. I love, love, love this book.

My copy has no covers, so I had no idea what to expect. Took this as a holiday read in case I have to leave the book behind. Turned out to be an interesting read starting as a story of a mentally unstable woman who begins a building process that is not only about building a house, but also her mind and personality. Detours to family history, and towards the end the story turns into a full-on thriller. Very suprising and suspenseful, will look into the author.

I limit my collections due to space in my home, otherwise this would be a keeper. It was a neat little mystery set in the Pacific Northwest. Great characters, tough problems. An interesting if unsettling insight into the depths of melancholia. Unsettling because some of it hits too close to home.

Folly is a stand-alone novel, not part of either of King's well-known mystery series. It tells the story of a woman coming back from a madness into which she was pushed by unbearable tragedy. On the island Folly, which Rae Newborn inherits from a great-uncle, she re-builds the house that once stood there, her relationship with her family, and the sanity which still threatens to crumble away. When Rae begins to suspect that she is not alone on the island, she has to figure out whether the other inhabitant is real or a creation of her residual insanity.