Shutter
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- CHF 3.50
Beschreibung des Verlags
Longlisted for the National Book Award
This blood-chilling debut set in New Mexico’s Navajo Nation is equal parts gripping crime thriller, supernatural horror, and poignant portrayal of coming of age on the reservation.
"A haunting thriller, written with exquisite suspense . . . This is a story that won't let you go long after you finish, and you won't want it to end even as you can't stop reading to find out how it does."
—Tommy Orange, author of There There
Rita Todacheene is a forensic photographer working for the Albuquerque police force. Her excellent photography skills have cracked many cases—she is almost supernaturally good at capturing details. In fact, Rita has been hiding a secret: she sees the ghosts of crime victims who point her toward the clues that other investigators overlook.
As a lone portal back to the living for traumatized spirits, Rita is terrorized by nagging ghosts who won’t let her sleep and who sabotage her personal life. Her taboo and psychologically harrowing ability was what drove her away from the Navajo reservation, where she was raised by her grandmother. It has isolated her from friends and gotten her in trouble with the law.
And now it might be what gets her killed.
When Rita is sent to photograph the scene of a supposed suicide on a highway overpass, the furious, discombobulated ghost of the victim—who insists she was murdered—latches onto Rita, forcing her on a quest for revenge against her killers, and Rita finds herself in the crosshairs of one of Albuquerque’s most dangerous cartels. Written in sparkling, gruesome prose, Shutter is an explosive debut from one of crime fiction's most powerful new voices.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Rita Todacheene, the narrator of Emerson's strong debut, has excelled at her job with the Albuquerque (N.Mex.) PD's Crime Scene Specialist Unit for the past five years, exposing valuable clues through her meticulous photography. Flair and technical expertise aside, much of her success is due to a unique ability to communicate with the ghosts of crime victims. It's a gift she discovered during childhood, but these unusual powers come at a price—her peculiar behavior and obsession with "imaginary friends" alienated her from her classmates and drove her out of her Navajo community. Ever since, damaged spirits, desperate for her help, plague her, pushing her to the edge of sanity and making her friends and colleagues question her psychological competence. After photographing a grisly highway suicide, she's coerced into investigating members of the police force with connections to the victim and major players in a Mexican drug cartel, ultimately drawing her into a perilous quest for truth and justice. Rich, expressive prose matches the suspenseful storytelling. Only the predictable finale disappoints. Crime fiction fans will relish this keenly balanced paranormal page-turner and piquant coming-of-age yarn.
