I’m over the moon to be taking part in Helen Fitzgerald’s ASH MOUNTAIN blog tour today! My thanks to Anne Cater and Orenda Books for the ARC and invite on this tour. First up – a bit about the author and this AMAZING book before I share my review!
About the Author
Helen FitzGerald is the bestselling author of Dead Lovely (2007) and nine other adult and young adult thrillers, including My Last Confession (2009), The Donor (2011) and most recently The Cry (2013), which was longlisted for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. Helen has worked as a criminal justice social worker for over ten years. She is one of thirteen children and grew up in Victoria, Australia. She now lives in Glasgow with her husband and two children.
About the Book
Single-mother Fran returns to her sleepy hometown to care for her dying father when a devastating bush fire breaks out. A heartbreaking disaster-noir thriller from the bestselling author of The Cry.
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Fran hates her hometown, and she thought she’d escaped. But her father is ill, and needs care. Her relationship is over, and she hates her dead-end job in the city, anyway.
She returns home to nurse her dying father, her distant teenage daughter in tow for the weekends. There, in the sleepy town of Ash Mountain, childhood memories prick at her fragile self-esteem, she falls in love for the first time, and her demanding dad tests her patience, all in the unbearable heat of an Australian summer. As past friendships and rivalries are renewed, and new ones forged, Fran’s tumultuous home life is the least of her worries, when old crimes rear their heads and a devastating bushfire ravages the town and all of its inhabitants…
Simultaneously a warm, darkly funny portrait of small-town life – and a woman and a land in crisis – and a shocking and truly distressing account of a catastrophic event that changes things forever, Ash Mountain is a heart-breaking slice of domestic noir, and a disturbing disaster thriller that you will never forget…
Set in Australia in the ‘sleepy hometown’ of Ash Mountain, the reader is taken on a journey about relationships, destruction, devastation, family, loss, tragedy, grief, hope, survival, discrimination, abuse and survival.
Bloody hell! What a read. The author is a master at pulling the reader into a story right from the start. The fear I felt as I read the words and the story unfolded was palpable. INCREDIBLE! Amongst the horror and devastation left by the fire from Ash Mountain, the reader learns about Fran through a well laid out dual timeline. So many emotions! The description throughout the book was SO REAL – you could feel the pain and melancholy, sadness, good times and regret – Fran was such a well written character, I almost felt like I was reading a memoir rather than a fictional story.
There was a great narrative that drew you to the various characters, and with a believable and heart-wrenching storyline you can’t help but turn the pages as the suspense builds. The story is told in five parts and there are just no words to describe with any sort of justice how absolutely phenomenal this book is!
Would I recommend this read? Great balls of ?- you bet your ass I do! Atmospheric, gripping, relevant and intense – Ash Mountain blew me away! This author has never let me down and I highly recommend you grab Ash Mountain today!
