When Eleanor’s grandmother died, she found out the family secret. She had never known her father, and her mother died of cancer when she was young. So her grandmother Vivienne had raised her. And even though Eleanor is an adult now, out on her own, she still has dinner with Vivienne once a week. And in all those years, Vivienne had never mentioned Solhöga, the manor house about an hour and half north of Stockholm that had been a part of her life for decades.
Vivienne didn’t die peacefully in her sleep. Eleanor had been coming over for dinner when she found Vivienne on the floor in a pool of blood, silver scissors in her neck. Eleanor had seen the murderer pass by her, but she hadn’t recognized the person. She suffers from prosopagnosia, a condition where she can’t recognize faces. She makes up for it in her daily life by memorizing facets of a person’s face—the hairline, the jawline, the hairstyle. And she can recognize voices. But the person who had rushed past her that night hadn’t said a word, so Eleanor couldn’t register who it was.
Six months later, a lawyer had called Eleanor and told her about Solhöga, saying they needed to meet out there to do an inventory of the house and its outbuildings. She picks a weekend and heads out there with her boyfriend of 6 years Sebastian, meeting the lawyer Rickard and her aunt Veronika at the manor house. There is a groundskeeper, Bergtsson, but repeated calls to him went to voicemail. Eleanor thought he might meet them when they showed up at the house, but he was nowhere in sight.
They get settled in the house and purchase food for several days, since the weather forecast is for cold, wind, and snow. They choose bedrooms for the weekend and get settled in for the night so they can start on the inventory first thing in the morning. But with a giant painting of Vivienne, her husband Evert, and their children Veronika and Vendela (Eleanor’s mother) in the front hallway, Eleanor finds it difficult to relax. There is something off, something creepy about Solhöga, and she just wants to get back home to Stockholm.
The next day, as the lawyer starts to look through the paperwork in the library, Eleanor and Sebastian set out to look at the outbuildings, and to try to find Bergtsson. They find a woodshed, a barn, and what looks like Bergtsson’s home. But there is no one there. There seems to be a blizzard brewing, so they head back to the main house. There they find Veronika screaming at Rickard about some missing letters. She thinks the lawyer stole her letters from her father, but that makes no sense to Eleanor. She calms Veronika down and helps her look, but the letters are nowhere to be found.
But Eleanor does find a diary hidden under a floorboard. It’s the diary of a young woman who had worked for Vivienne and Evert back in the 1960s. It’s not all in Swedish, so Eleanor can’t read it, but maybe she can translate it on her phone, or at least figure out what language it’s written in.
Eleanor can feel that Solhöga has secrets. It was a secret to her for so long, and now she just knows that something has been buried here. She can hear voices around her. She sees shadows that look like strangers. She can feel that something is wrong with Solhöga, and she’s determined to find out what happened there before she can leave it behind her. But will the house destroy them to keep its own secrets?
Author Camilla Sten, translated by Alexandra Fleming, brings us The Resting Place, a chilling novel of family secrets and lies. Told in alternating timelines, from Eleanor’s present day and household help Anushka back in the ‘60s, this novel unfolds slowly, with surprises and twists throughout. Sten’s writing sparkles like the newly fallen snow, but the storytelling is a winter storm, lulling you into a false sense of comfort until she brings up a bitter wind, blowing in with answers and truths, turning you around and around until you’re not sure what’s real, letting the ground shift beneath you until can find your footing again.
The Resting Place took my breath away. It’s so beautiful and harsh, cold and warming all at once, as I marveled at the depth of the family’s dysfunction and the courage of Eleanor to face each day anyway. As all the pieces of her taut plotting fell into place, I found myself unable to set the book aside until I knew it all. If you love a good, creepy, chilling thriller, then this one is not to be missed!
Egalleys for The Resting Place were provided by Minotaur Books through NetGalley, with many thanks.
