THE CUTTING SEASON (ATTICA LOCKE)

 

 

Story Description: 

 

HarperCollins Publishers|September 10, 2012|Hardcover|ISBN: 978-0-06-220146-1 

 

In The Cutting Season, a riveting thriller intertwines two murders separated across more than a century.  

 

Caren Gray manages Belle Vie, a sprawling antebellum plantation that sits between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, where the past and the present coexist uneasily.  The estate’s owners have turned the place into an eerie tourist attraction, complete with full-dress re-enactments and carefully restored slave quarters.  Outside the gates, a corporation with ambitious plans has been busy snapping up land from struggling families who have been growing sugar can for generations, and now replacing local employees with illegal laborers.  Tensions mount when the body of a female migrant worker is found in a shallow grave on the edge of the property, her throat cut clean.   

 

As the investigation gets under way, the list of suspects grows.  But when fresh evidence comes to light and the sheriff’s department zeros in on a person of interest, Caren has a bad feeling that the police are chasing the wrong leads.  Putting herself at risk, she ventures into dangerous territory as she unearths startling new facts about a very old mystery-the-long-ago disappearance of a former slave – that has unsettling ties to the current murder.  In pursuit of the truth about Belle Vie’s history and her own, Caren discovers secrets about both cases – ones that an increasingly desperate killer will stop at nothing to keep buried. 

 

Taut, hauntingly resonant, and beautifully written, The Cutting Season is at once a thoughtful meditation on how America reckons its past with its future, and a high-octane page-turner that unfolds with tremendous skill and vision.  With her rare gift for depicting human nature in all its complexities, Attica Locke demonstrates once again that she is “destined for literary stardom” (Dallas Morning News). 

 

My Review: 

 

For some reason, try as I might, I just couldn’t get into this story at all.  I attempted it three different times but it just didn’t pique my interest or hold my attention.  I’d heard so much about this novel and was looking forward to reading it so much that perhaps I set my expectations too high.  Therefore I will leave you without a review but you have the synopsis of the book above to peruse.  I’m sure someone out there will just love this book!