Sixteen Horses: A Novel

Let's be clear: this book is absolutely worth the hype. Buchanan's writing is atmospheric, gripping, chilling, evocative and beautifully precise. I bought both a hardback copy and the audiobook for myself, as well as hardbacks for friends as gifts. We all loved them. The narrator of the audiobook is brilliant, too. Only drawback: steer clear if you can't stomach animal death/cruelty. It's kinda what this book's about.

I would have given this book one star but for the compelling subject. The narrative structure excluded this reader from whatever was in the author's intention in writing the book. The trailing thoughts of the characters, the abrupt time shifts, the elusive notes and clues to the crime and the vague 'philosophizing' about death all were presented as unhelpful fragments from the author's unconscious . There's a reader here, dear author. Have pity, The last time I was this frustrated was when I was reading student essays whose paragraphs began with "it".

I have never wanted to un-read a book more in my life. The story is slow telling and just barely interesting enough to keep you reading. The constant changes in point of view make it impossible to follow at times and it's easy to forget what's even happened in the earlier parts of the book once you're in the thick of it. There are too many subplots and unnecessary added back stories going on at once for it to even make sense. Frankly, had the author stuck to just the two characters that the jacket copy said there would be, he'd have been much better off getting the story told, but I can't imagine it would have been much help seeing as it hardly has an ending.

This five star debut first captivated me while reading the 5 chapter sampler back in June, 2020 and the full novel was everything I’d hoped for plus more. It’s a blend of Noir, psychological suspense, police procedural, violent splashes of horror plus a dash of historical drama. I was fascinated with the backstory so much that I paused my reading to do a quick dive via google for additional information. The novel is a actually a braid of multiple tightly woven storylines: (1) Alec, the local detective, (2) the forensic veterinarian on assignment, Cooper, (3) the seaside town that’s now only a decrepit ghost standing the shadow of its former glory and (4) the villagers were who are its last remaining residents. Mr. Buchanan’s writing is both vividly visual and aural, since I could not only see the stores and landscape shrouded in gothic-like fog, but I could practically hear the cracking arcade speakers playing carnival/funfair music in the background of the town. In many ways this reminded me of Broadchurch (probably because I’ve already cast David Tenant as Alec). So fans of that tv series, Hinterland / Y Gwyll as well as Shetland will love this exciting thriller.

This was a hard novel to read and, in retrospect, the blurb talking about horses’ heads buried in the dirt should have given me a clue that an animal lover would find the plot especially disturbing. I thought it would just be a random beginning about human crimes, but there is a lot of animal cruelty and some parts I had to skip altogether. That said, the novel is fantastic. Dark and horrifying, but very well written. The random cruelty inherent in all the characters, in all of us, is devastating but I still had to learn what was going on. Nothing is predictable here, the twists are unexpected and very well crafted. The insight into every character’s mind is like watching an accident, you don’t want to know, but you can’t look away and little throwaway sentences are deeply haunting (a dog who forgot what a toy is had me in tears). The audiobook performance by Louise Brealey is well done and all the characters are defined so that it’s easy to follow the action. I would not recommend this to people who can’t stand to think of animal suffering but, if you can stomach it, this is a great novel. I chose to listen to this audiobook and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, NetGalley/Macmillan Audio!