Review: The Cutting Season by Attica Locke

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Harper; First Edition edition (September 18, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061802050
• ISBN-13: 978-0061802058

Product Description

The American South in the twenty-first century. A plantation owned for generations by a rich family. So much history. And a dead body.

Just after dawn, Caren walks the grounds of Belle Vie, the historic plantation house in Louisiana that she has managed for four years. Today she sees nothing unusual, apart from some ground that has been dug up by the fence bordering the sugar can fields. Assuming an animal has been out after dark, she asks the gardener to tidy it up. Not long afterwards, he calls her to say it's something else. Something terrible. A dead body. At a distance, she missed her. The girl, the dirt and the blood. Now she has police on site, an investigation in progress, and a member of staff no one can track down. And Caren keeps uncovering things she will wish she didn't know. As she's drawn into the dead girl's story, she makes shattering discoveries about the future of Belle Vie, the secrets of its past, and sees, more clearly than ever, that Belle Vie, its beauty, is not to be trusted.

A magnificent, sweeping story of the south, The Cutting Season brings history face-to-face with modern America, where Obama is president, but some things will never change. Attica Locke once again provides an unblinking commentary on politics, race, the law, family and love, all within a thriller every bit as gripping and tragic as her first novel, Black Water Rising.


About The Author

 Attica Locke is a screenwriter who has worked in both film and television. A native of Houston, Texas, she lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.

My Review
  

This is my first time reading Attica Locke and it won't be my last.  Excellent mystery wrapped around a southern gothic setting.  It's a story about a single mom who is dealing with the issues that come with that.  An absentee father who finally says the right things even though it is too late.  It is about a family not necessarily being made up of blood relatives.  And righting past wrongs as well as new ones.

I found it a bit slow in the beginning but stick with it as the author is setting the mood and the stage for what follows. I didn't always think that the main character, Caren made the right choices, but then who of us does.  There are twists and turns that keep your heart racing at times.  All in all, a great read.  I do recommend The Cutting Season by Attica Locke.