Scrap
A Novel
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- USD 14.99
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- USD 14.99
Descripción editorial
A true-crime-obsessed young artist is drawn into the lives of an deliriously wealthy family in this fantastically entertaining thriller from Calla Henkel, author of Other People’s Clothes
Laced with pitch-black humor and conspiratorial unease, Scrap is a razor-sharp examination of wealth and power, art and truth, of the line between justice and revenge—and who gets to cross it.
Recently dumped and stuck with a mortgage, artist Esther Ray wants to burn the world, but instead, she reluctantly accepts a scrapbooking job from the deliriously wealthy Naomi Duncan. The scrapbooks, a secret birthday gift for Naomi’s husband, Bryce, trace the Duncan’s 25-year marriage.
The conditions: Esther must include every piece of paper she’s been sent, must sign an NDA, and must only contact Naomi using the burner phone provided. Otherwise she’ll spoil the surprise.
As Esther binges true-crime podcasts and works through the near-200 boxes of Duncan detritus, she finds herself infatuated with the gilded family—until, mid-project, Naomi dies suspiciously. When Esther becomes convinced the husband killed her, she uses the scrapbooks’ trove of information to insert herself into the Duncans’ lives to prove it.
But the more Esther investigates, the further she is dragged back to the scorched earth of her past and the famous artist who paid her to disappear.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Henkle's overstuffed latest (after Other People's Clothes) centers on a scrapbook artist investigating the death of her client. Esther Ray returns home to North Carolina after a vacation and discovers that her girlfriend has left her. Now solely responsible for her mortgage payments, Esther takes a job with the wealthy Naomi Duncan, who asks her to bind documents and family photos into scrapbooks as a birthday gift for Naomi's husband, Bryce. From the beginning, Naomi is dodgy about the job, forcing Esther to sign a five-page NDA and only communicate with her via a burner phone. As Esther trawls through the documents, she grows obsessed with Naomi and Bryce's glamorous life, though she notices hints of darkness around its edges. After Naomi dies in an apparent skiing accident, Esther gradually comes to suspect that Bryce may have killed her. In one flashback after another, Henkle details Esther's childhood traumas, her obsession with true crime podcasts, and the unhinged intensity that has gotten her fired from previous jobs. Under the weight of all this exposition, the novel wobbles on the way toward its outlandish conclusion. Despite an intriguing setup, this falls short.
