Everything and Nothing by Araminta Hall
Ruth and Christian, like many modern couples, are desperately feeling pressured to ‘have it all.’ With two fairly demanding jobs, two small children, and a large house that won’t clean itself, they have just about reached breaking point when a new nanny walks into their lives. If Agatha seems too good to be true, it’s probably because she is. Deeply ambivalent about the act of hiring someone to raise her children, and struggling with her own conflicting feelings about motherhood, Ruth reacts by shutting her family out even more. The relationship between husband and wife begins to resemble a disaster zone, and there are some wry observations about the difficulty of trying to keep too many balls in the air. Meanwhile, Agatha gets on with the business of putting everything to rights. Will Ruth realise the danger she has invited into her home? Or will it be too late? A gripping read with an insightful mix of tension and social commentary.
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The Caller by Karin Fossum
One mild summer evening Lily and her husband are enjoying a meal while their baby daughter Margrete sleeps peacefully in her pram beneath a tree. But when Lily steps out she is paralysed with terror: the eight-month-old is drenched in blood. Inspector Sejer is called to the hospital to meet the family. Baby Margrete is, thankfully, unharmed, but her parents are traumatised and Sejer wonders who would have carried out such a cruel act. Later the same night, after some television coverage of the incident, Sejer is home alone when an envelope drops through his letterbox. Inside the envelope, the inspector finds a postcard bearing a short message: ‘Hell begins now’. Within just a few pages, Fossum sets the scene for one of her typically tension-filled psychological thrillers.
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