just finished reading

I won't compare this to the author's breakthrough debut novel The Girl On The Train. The narrative shifts from past to present, linking the characters through stories told about the women in the water. I'm not quite sure who the main character is--there are many different perspectives here (and sometimes I got a little confused as to who was talking): Danielle, known as Nel's death triggers her sister's (Julia, known as Jules) return to the small, gloomy town of Beckford. Other narrators include Sean Townsend (Detective Inspector), Nickie (local madwoman), Lena (Nel’s daughter), Mark (Lena’s teacher), Louise (Katie’s mother), Erin (policewoman), Patrick (Sean’s father), and Helen (Sean’s wife). Although there is quite a cast of narrating characters, the story is really about the folklore of Beckford's river. A story with many, many layers.

From the publisher:

A single mother turns up dead at the bottom of the river that runs through town. Earlier in the summer, a vulnerable teenage girl met the same fate. They are not the first women lost to these dark waters, but their deaths disturb the river and its history, dredging up secrets long submerged.

Left behind is a lonely fifteen-year-old girl. Parentless and friendless, she now finds herself in the care of her mother’s sister, a fearful stranger who has been dragged back to the place she deliberately ran from—a place to which she vowed she’d never return.