It’s an autumn afternoon, in the lively garden of a chic suburban house. Somewhere in a gentrified neighborhood, of which there are so many, almost everywhere. Here and there, children have fun, innocently. For their part, the adults toast, chat and chat. Not exactly innocently, we quickly understand.
It is in this atmosphere which is reminiscent of the popular series from the 2000s Desperate Housewives begins the fascinating new novel by Ashley Audrain, this Ontarian literary phenomenon in 2021, who seduced the entire planet with her chilling first opus, Among all mothers (The Push). A text which, three years later, still lives with us.
It gives you an idea of the power of the author’s writing, which returns here in force, and still exploiting the tortuous themes of motherhood, although on a completely different level. Perhaps less daring (twisted?) than the first, these Whispers are no less bewitching. The kind of book you read in one go, a real one page turnerin good French.
We’ll quickly summarize why. It’s that during this good-natured cocktail, without warning, the hostess, a certain Whitney, a career and leading woman and mother of three children, suddenly disappears. From the third floor, her guests hear her despite themselves (despite herself!) yelling obscenities at her eldest, little Xavier, 10 years old. Gone is the veneer of perfection that has shone until now. A few pages and months later, here we are in the emergency room of the local hospital. A 10-year-old child, this same Xavier, apparently fell out of a window in the middle of the night. His little inanimate body is between life and death.
Chilling, you say? Did he fall accidentally, on purpose, could it be that he was pushed, by a gesture as monstrous as it was desperate?
Doubt torments us and obsesses us throughout this breathtaking thriller, a feminine psychological suspense, very skillfully knitted, tighter than we could even imagine.
It is that quietly, but surely, and thanks to short chapters, and several back and forths in time, alternating between the story of a neighbor, then of another, the author develops her plot. Of course, it’s sometimes a bit dizzying. But this is also what makes the text so rich, since these women all have much more complicated lives than their flower beds suggest.
In addition to the famous Whitney, for whom motherhood is a burden and career a buoy, we discover her antithesis and good friend Blair, a happy stay-at-home mother although her husband has died. There is also Mara, an octogenarian immigrant with a troubled past, and quite heartbreaking motherhood, thank you. And finally, to complete the portrait: Rebecca, doctor and only woman without children in the group, who we believe a priori spared from the horrors of the thing. And we obviously got it all wrong.
We are swimming here in the middle of a maternal thriller, certainly, but also a feminine, romantic one, where infidelity, identity, freedom and guilt joyfully intertwine. Or rather: cruelly. A truly disturbing book to devour without hesitation.
Whispers
JC Lattès
375 pages