Product Description

Jane Hudson never thought she would return to Heart Lake. Her years there as a scholarship girl ended in a double tragedy. Now she is back, struggling to adjust to her new life teaching Latin and as a single mother. But the events that haunted her memories for so many years begin to recur in front of her eyes. It seems she alone can see what is happening, and only she will be able to prevent a second catastrophe. Surrounded by the lake that gives the school its name, steeped in history and overflowing with the emotions of teenage girls, Heart Lake guards its past - but cannot keep it hidden.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #97554 in Books
• Published on: 2003-01-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Daily Express
‘Fulfilling … Miss Jean Brodie meets Donna Tartt … a good read, promising much for the future’

Family Circle
‘A gripping, well-written psychological thriller, rich in atmospheric detail’

Woman & Home
‘A highly charged novel of suspense that will have you riveted to your chair’ Woman & Home

Customer Reviews

Brilliant
After reading through god know's how many recommended 'Chic Lit' books I was starting to think there were not any good books out there! This book however, changed my opinion. I found it so captivating and exciting that I really couldn't put it down. It's one of those books that fits so brilliantly together at the end, that you sit there going "Ooohhhh! I see....." The plot is very clever, and it's a real pleasure to find a book that is so beautifully written. If you liked this then I would also recommend Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History' to you.

the most spellbinding book ive read in ages - excellent
Jane Hudson has returned to Heart Lake – a girl’s school nestled cosily beside the waters of said lake – after 20 years to teach Latin. Many years ago, whilst studying there as a scholarship student under the charismatic Domina Chambers, a tragic series of events (the suicides of two roommates and her best-friend’s brother) occurred, that burnt themselves into the very fabric of Jane’s self, affecting who she is today. Now she’s back at the school, amidst the turbulent emotions of the teenage girls, struggling to cope with all the emergent memories, when, with horror she has to watch as the cathartic events of two decades ago appear to be recurring before her eyes…

This book is quite, quite amazing. I’ve not read a novel containing such rich, beautiful prose in a long while, with each word combining to form a fully realised almost tangible image, full of wonderful detail. Certainly, I’ve never come across a writer who can describe a lake in so many varied, and, quite frankly, once again beautiful, ways, with each new descriptions causing a bright smile of utter contentment to spread across my face, happy in the knowledge that our language can be used to evoke such wonder from a single image. The tone is, often, very claustrophobic and haunting, given the insular nature of the community in which the involving mysteries take place, and especially when concerning the eerie “three sisters”, - named thus due to an old myth surrounding the school - which are 3 stones which rise up out of Heart Lake, and seem to have some kind of mystical pull over the impressionable teenage girls of the school.

The characters are great, especially Jane Hudson (our likeable and very human narrator) and her young students, whom, in her Latin class are given classical “nicknames”, such as Vesta and Athena, which may be indulgent, but I found to be another completely magical touch. The plot itself is marvellous, original and puzzling all the way through and very engagingly told. Some people have said that aspects of the plot are predictable, but I didn’t find them so…I was far too wrapped up in the writing style to bother trying to second-guess the plotline. There are revelations throughout the story, each one bringing a wonderful level of ice-like clarity to one particular feature of the plot. The suspense is built up masterfully, yet almost invisibly, so you don’t notice it much, until suddenly there is a great sense of foreboding at the events soon to come. I am surprised that this is her first novel. All of this culminates brilliantly – along with the explanation of what truly happened all those years ago – to a pulse-pounding conclusion atop the frozen-solid surface of the lake.

Some books appeal to the heart, and some to the mind. For me, this one went straight to the soul.

Beautiful and compelling
"Latin's a dead language,
As dead as dead can be.
It killed off all the Romans,
And now it's killing me."
The old rhyme seems to be coming true for Heart Lake School for Girls, and not for the first time.

Like every girl at Heart Lake, Jane Hudson had known the old legend of the three sisters, transformed into rocks in the lake, who lured the unsuspecting out to their death by drowning. In her senior year, her two roommates and the boy she secretly loves are drowned in the lake: suicide, or accident? The School blames their Latin teacher, the charismatic Helen Chambers; Jane thinks she knows the truth, which now lies at the bottom of the Lake.

After the birth of her daughter, and her separation from the father, Jane returns to Heart Lake to take up Helen's old post. When pages from her senior year journal, long thought lost, begin to appear amongst her students' assignments, and then one of her class is found having apparantly attempted suicide, it seems that events are repeating themselves, or at least, that someone wants to make it seem that way. Then her love's cousin, a man with his own strange link to Jane's past reappears. Is everything just adolescent hysteria, or is something more sinister happening?

I enjoyed this very much. Though there are obvious plot similarities with Donna Tartt's The Secret History, this is a much more emotional book, its insanity much closer to the surface. In particular, the change between schoolgirl Jane, weak, scared, insecure, and the more assured Jane who returns to Heart Lake is well done. The plotting is intricate if a little heavy-handed. I defy anyone not to see who the villain is by about half way through, though ultimately, this does not matter; the important transformation is Jane's discovery of the truth about her own past, and this is completely compelling.