Title: A Room Swept White
Author: Sophie Hannah
Type: Fiction
Page Count/Review Word Count: 474
Rating: 4/5
I’m not too sure what I was expecting when I went into this one, but I’m pretty sure that what I got was very different to what the cover and title led me to believe. Not that I’m complaining.
The premise here is that a documentary is being made which follows the fortunes of a few different women who were convicted of murdering their babies and later found to be innocent. Suddenly, one of those women is murdered, and so our story begins.
We see developments through a few different pairs of eyes, including through the police force and through the eyes of the woman who finds herself directing the documentary after the previous director pretty much throws it into her lap. That in itself is kind of strange because it was basically his passion project.
The result is a murder mystery that’s also a police procedural novel and which has a little something extra, too. It’s a claustrophobic-feeling read with a lot to offer, from memorable characters to a plot that doesn’t give up and a weird little kid who’s obsessed with race horses and remembers seeing a man with a magic umbrella.
Sophie Hannah is pretty good at writing crime thrillers, and while this might not be as fast-paced and full of twists and turns as something like Gone Girl, that doesn’t make it any less enjoyable. I’ve read at least a half dozen of Hannah’s books by this point and this is quite possibly my favourite of the lot.
Of course, by the very nature of the book, I can’t tell you too much without risking spoilers, but that’s okay. Even though I said it’s not as full of twists as some other thrillers, there’s still plenty there to keep you reading. I normally don’t try to figure out who the culprit is, preferring instead to allow the author to reveal that in their own time, but I couldn’t help myself with this one. And I still didn’t get it right.
The book’s title comes from a poem that plays a minor role in the plot, but it does a good enough job of things. I don’t know what I would have called it myself because it’s one of those books that covers a lot of ground and doesn’t really fit into a narrow little box. Or, if you’d prefer, it’s less of a room swept white and more of a house filled with colours.
Sophie Hannah isn’t for everyone, and I know that a few of my friends don’t get on with her, but I’ve enjoyed most of her books so far. I even gave this one to my girlfriend because she said it sounded interesting.