Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent

 

Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent.

Published 2nd March 2023 by Sandycove.

From the cover of the book:

Sally Diamond cannot understand why what she did was so strange. She was only doing what her father told her to do, to put him out with the rubbish when he died.

Now Sally is the centre of attention, not only from the hungry media and police detectives, but also a sinister voice from a past she cannot remember. As she begins to discover the horrors of her childhood, Sally steps into the world for the first time, making new friends and big decisions, and learning that people don't always mean what they say.

But who is the man observing Sally from the other side of the world? And why does her neighbour seem to be obsessed with her? Sally's trust issues are about to be severely challenged . . .

***********

Sally Diamond is not your average 40-something woman. She has been living a very reclusive life in the Irish countryside with her widowed father, and while her strange ways have never been an issue between them, his death is about to bring her very unwelcome notice - especially when Sally takes his throw-away comment to 'put his body out with the rubbish' to heart.

Suddenly the centre of attention, Sally is not only forced to cope with a police investigation and the media frenzy her behaviour has brought, but the news that her origins are rather different than she thought. The fact emerges that Sally was adopted by her parents when she was seven years old, and although she cannot remember anything before that time, the forgotten years of her early childhood have indelibly shaped the course of her life.

Sally now has to come to terms with her sinister origins, and to learn to become part of the community in a meaningful way for the first time. Her progress is slow and difficult, but she begins to find her feet, making friends and deciding her own fate... until the arrival of an object from her murky past stops her in her tracks. Memories of her early life begin to resurface, and with them suspicions about the intentions of others. Who is the mysterious person called 'S' on the other side of the world who sent her the object that has set her on this unsettling path, and why is the man she though was her friend so interested in her past? 

This book begins by lulling you into a false sense of security, introducing you to Sally with an episode rife with black humour, when her very literal way of looking at the world gets her into a spot of bother. Sally is a complex character, but despite her complete inability to deal with people and her tendency to the occasional violent outburst when everything gets too much, she is not without her charms. As she begins to make progress dealing with the truth about her parenthood at the same time as coping with the changes she cannot now avoid, her character develops in positive ways and you become very fond of her. 

However, as the story unfurls, the unimaginable darkness at the heart of Sally's story reveals itself through the introduction of another narrative - the voice of someone closely connected with her past life. The story takes a very disturbing twist, jolting you back and forth between the present and the past to explain why Sally is the way she is in horrifying detail. Nugent spins her literary sorcery to hook you completely into a tale that delves into themes of abuse, and repeating patterns of dysfunctional behaviour. The insidious acts of others ripple through time with dire consequences for the lives of the people touched by them, and although there are heartwarming and humorous moments, this book becomes intensely disturbing. There are multiple scenes that are very difficult to read, and yet Nugent's writing makes them impossible to look away from.

This book runs the gamut of the emotional range, becoming increasingly sadder and darker as events spiral out of control. The guilt of others underlies every part of this tale, which makes it very provoking too. It is tense, utterly compelling, and will knock you sideways - possibly, Nugent's best psychological thriller yet!

Strange Sally Diamond is available to buy now in hardcover, ebook and audio formats.

Thank you to Penguin Books for sending me a proof of this book in return for an honest review, and for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.

About the author: 

Before becoming a full-time writer, Liz Nugent worked in film, theatre and television. Her four novels - Unravelling Oliver, Lying in Wait, Skin Deep and Our Little Cruelties have each been Number One bestsellers and she has won four Irish Book Awards, as well as the James Joyce Medal for Literature. She lives in Dublin.