RaveThe GuardianThe plot of this tightly wound psychological thriller is deceptively simple, centring not on a woman’s flight from Haiti, but a native daughter’s return to a country that has too frequently been viewed solely through the lens of political turmoil and poverty … Because the novel is told in the past tense, we know from the outset that Mireille will physically survive her ordeal, and in this way, Gay turns the thriller form on its head. Murder is not the ultimate crime here. The novel’s suspense is instead built around the question of what one woman’s body can endure as punishment for her father’s supposed misdeeds.
