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God's Country
Guy Flood returns to the Black Country with his girlfriend Alison, to attend his identical twin brother's funeral. The reasons he left, and the secrets he left behind, slowly become clear. A chilling dark fiction, dominated by an unknown and all-seeing narrator.
143 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
February 19, 2023
3.5 stars rounded up. When Guy returns to his childhood home, in the Black Country, along with his girlfriend Alison it reopens old wounds. His reason for returning is valid enough - his twin brother Ivan has died and he wants to attend the funeral. But as he and Alison attempt to fit in it becomes evident that there is much more to this family and community than meets the eye…
This is an unusual tale with an unusual style - the story is told by an all seeing omniscient narrator who appears removed from the scene so it can become difficult to trust the reliability. Told in the style of ‘she’ll say she listened to the way he spoke..’ or ‘she’ll tell him how she heard..’ which I’ll admit did take me a while to get used to. However it definitely added to the story’s atmosphere. It’s simmering with menace and unease, and the remoteness of the narration enhanced that tenfold.
This is a bleak tale, there is no light here, but it’s hugely, hugely evocative and filled with foreboding and tension. I read it with a sense of unease and apprehension, keen to learn of the secrets shut away within this family. It’s a relatively short read, just 141 pages so if you like to break out now and then and try something different and definitely original, then this is for you.
This is an unusual tale with an unusual style - the story is told by an all seeing omniscient narrator who appears removed from the scene so it can become difficult to trust the reliability. Told in the style of ‘she’ll say she listened to the way he spoke..’ or ‘she’ll tell him how she heard..’ which I’ll admit did take me a while to get used to. However it definitely added to the story’s atmosphere. It’s simmering with menace and unease, and the remoteness of the narration enhanced that tenfold.
This is a bleak tale, there is no light here, but it’s hugely, hugely evocative and filled with foreboding and tension. I read it with a sense of unease and apprehension, keen to learn of the secrets shut away within this family. It’s a relatively short read, just 141 pages so if you like to break out now and then and try something different and definitely original, then this is for you.
July 6, 2023
He’ll say he knew what to expect with this book. He might admit he was wrong. But how will you know who’s telling the truth? He’ll believe he remembers places like this God’s Country, places as dark and haunting as this one. The dreamlike nature of the prose will seem like memories to him, dreams maybe or locations learnt some other way.
Kerry Hadley-Pryce is a master of her genre. This claustrophobic, discomforting, unreliable narration is definitely becoming her trademark, and it has a way of hooking one’s curiosity from the start. The author presents an unmistakable backdrop for her characters that has become eerily familiar over three disturbing novels. Her rich description of place is poetic and clearly shows an attention to detail that brings it richly to life. This Black Country of hers, this God’s Country, exudes a love of place and its people, giving the stories that spring from landscapes.
God's Country is a novel to be proud of
.
Kerry Hadley-Pryce is a master of her genre. This claustrophobic, discomforting, unreliable narration is definitely becoming her trademark, and it has a way of hooking one’s curiosity from the start. The author presents an unmistakable backdrop for her characters that has become eerily familiar over three disturbing novels. Her rich description of place is poetic and clearly shows an attention to detail that brings it richly to life. This Black Country of hers, this God’s Country, exudes a love of place and its people, giving the stories that spring from landscapes.
God's Country is a novel to be proud of
.
March 6, 2023
God’s Country is Kerry Hadley Pryce’s most densely written novel yet. It seems rather shorter than The Black Country and Gamble but you may find it takes you a little longer to read. The whole story is obscured behind a double, sometimes a triple veil of uncertainty: the almost entirely third person narrator, whose often overinsistent use of repetition suggests that they may not be trustworthy, tells us that, if we ask Alison, the point-of-view figure, then she will tell us that this or that event took place. In addition, the key occurrences of the novel are told to Alison by her partner Guy, whose involvement in them has left him deeply disturbed. So: can Alison trust Guy? Can the narrator trust Alison? Can we trust the narrator? In each case, not necessarily. I’ve not come across a narrative so keen to draw attention to its own unreliability since The Name of the Rose. And I’ve not come across so distinct a use of tense since Emma Tennant’s Wild Nights.
The phrase ‘it was as if…’, a sometimes annoying habit in Henry James which developed into a grotesque nervous tic in DH Lawrence, is used here just as often but to more focussed effect. In Hadley Pryce’s novel, it never fails to strongly imply ‘but, on the other hand, it could have been that…’ So, no, we rarely do quite know what’s going on, a fact reflected in the deeply ambiguous ending.
The power of the setting – an urban farm somewhere close to the hard-to-define boundaries between Lye, Pedmore and Quarry Bank – has been rightly praised by early reviewers. But even more impressive for me is the figure of the patriarch, Flood, a Noah whose ark – his farm – has been holed below the waterline by a compulsory purchase order; the death of his son Ivan seems to have affected him far less. Some will find him repulsive, others attractive but no attempt is made to minimise or excuse his tyranny – which, ultimately, makes the very precise degree of sympathy we feel for him all the more valid.
The influence of HP Lovecraft, which I noted in Gamble, is less insistent here, except where God’s Country revisits the canal weir in Stourbridge, a key location in the earlier novel also previously featured in books by Archie Hill and Joel Lane. Unsurprising: the place is bloody spooky. There’s perhaps a touch of Ackroyd’s Hawksmoor in the visionary ending and almost a hint of To the Lighthouse in the detail in which family disfunction is portrayed. But these influences are not overwhelming: in fact, I think this may be Hadley-Pryce’s most original novel so far – which is saying quite a lot.
And finally, we begin the story with Guy, Flood’s surviving son, travelling painfully slowly up a Ballardian vision of the M5 with his partner, Alison, a West Country woman who he met at a never-specified location close to her home – Exeter perhaps or Plymouth. The whole novel will be based around a West Country woman’s reaction to the south west corner of the Black Country. Here is a contemporary English novel in which London and the Home Counties might as well not exist: some reviewers are going to have a seizure.
The phrase ‘it was as if…’, a sometimes annoying habit in Henry James which developed into a grotesque nervous tic in DH Lawrence, is used here just as often but to more focussed effect. In Hadley Pryce’s novel, it never fails to strongly imply ‘but, on the other hand, it could have been that…’ So, no, we rarely do quite know what’s going on, a fact reflected in the deeply ambiguous ending.
The power of the setting – an urban farm somewhere close to the hard-to-define boundaries between Lye, Pedmore and Quarry Bank – has been rightly praised by early reviewers. But even more impressive for me is the figure of the patriarch, Flood, a Noah whose ark – his farm – has been holed below the waterline by a compulsory purchase order; the death of his son Ivan seems to have affected him far less. Some will find him repulsive, others attractive but no attempt is made to minimise or excuse his tyranny – which, ultimately, makes the very precise degree of sympathy we feel for him all the more valid.
The influence of HP Lovecraft, which I noted in Gamble, is less insistent here, except where God’s Country revisits the canal weir in Stourbridge, a key location in the earlier novel also previously featured in books by Archie Hill and Joel Lane. Unsurprising: the place is bloody spooky. There’s perhaps a touch of Ackroyd’s Hawksmoor in the visionary ending and almost a hint of To the Lighthouse in the detail in which family disfunction is portrayed. But these influences are not overwhelming: in fact, I think this may be Hadley-Pryce’s most original novel so far – which is saying quite a lot.
And finally, we begin the story with Guy, Flood’s surviving son, travelling painfully slowly up a Ballardian vision of the M5 with his partner, Alison, a West Country woman who he met at a never-specified location close to her home – Exeter perhaps or Plymouth. The whole novel will be based around a West Country woman’s reaction to the south west corner of the Black Country. Here is a contemporary English novel in which London and the Home Counties might as well not exist: some reviewers are going to have a seizure.
March 1, 2023
“black by day and red by night”
...
Guy Flood and his partner Alison, are driving up the M5 towards the Black Country. Guy is returning to his roots for the first time in many years. However, for him this is not a journey he wanted to make, particularly given the circumstances, to attend the funeral of his twin brother, Ivan.
Alison knows little of Guy’s past, as when she first met him, he was homeless, living on the streets and in quite a bad way, both mentally and physically. In recent times, they have both been working at the offices of the same newspaper, where Guy has risen from journalist to the position of editor and Alison is one of his reporters.
They have faced nothing but delays in their journey and tempers are getting a little frayed around the edges as Guy nears his destination. With Alison desperately trying to keep a secret from him, knowing full well that she shouldn’t really be making such an arduous journey and feeling worse by the minute, both of them are pleased when the end of their trek is in sight.
Being a ‘southerner’, Alison doesn’t know what to expect from Guy’s home, as he has only told her that he lived on a farm. She certainly isn’t prepared for neither the remoteness, nor the condition of the property and its meagre stock-holding. But bad first impressions are only set to become more shocking when she sees the inside of the building and meets the rest of Guy’s family – His sister Donna, his father Flood, the hired help Greebo, and baby Ivan, who seems to have been visited upon Donna as if by divine intervention and appears to Alison, to be badly neglected. Just to freak Alison out even more, Ivan’s body is lying in an open casket in the parlour.
The pair had planned to drive up, attend the funeral and then head back home, all in the same day. However, somehow, Guy had got the day of the funeral mixed up and it now turns out that they will have to stay overnight. Despite their protestations, Flood insists they stay in the squalor of the farmhouse, with no hot water or heating and the threat of a compulsory purchase order hanging over the rest of the building which hasn’t already fallen into ruination.
Whether it is Guy himself who confides in Alison, during that, the longest, strangest night of her life, about some of the terrible things events which made him leave his past behind him and has made him determined that he should never father children, or whether the unseen voice of the narrator is a tangible entity, it never becomes clear. However, little by little Guy appears to revert to his former self, as he begins to become as one with his surroundings and is almost imperceptibly drawn back into what remains of his disparate, morbid family. The old Guy, she discovers, isn’t one she really likes and the past never really has a habit of staying in the past, if you stir the pot too deeply.
When, as she is nosying around Ivan’s room, Alison discovers a rough bound copy of a book, written by his brother Guido (Guy) Flood, titled simply ‘God’s Country’, which she takes with a view to reading it, to try and understand what makes this man of hers tick. But will she ever get the chance to follow through, or even to make good her escape?
...
Oh, My Goodness! The second book in a row where the ending has left me hanging, lost for words and not able to form a single coherent thought – How much do these authors think a reader can take?
I have no idea what has just happened to me. I feel as though I have been transported to the darkest place of my worst nightmares, swallowed up and trapped in twenty-four hours of time that stood still, chewed up until I have had all the feelings and emotions sucked out of me, then spat back out and expected to get on with my life.
I know that I have just finished reading an amazing, very bold and chilling work of literary and societal fiction, with more than a passing nod to the undertones of horror I experienced, and which was simply begging to be devoured in a single reading session. However, I also realise that my journey of terror and disbelief will stay with me for a very long time and that it will probably take me every one of those precious moments to process the experience.
This was a short story of less than two hundred pages, which seemed to go on forever and yet, when the time came, I didn’t want to be over. I wanted, no needed, a definitive outcome, written down for me in black and white, so that I might possibly attempt to understand my mental torture. But that was not to be… and so I continue to wonder and speculate!
Told in the cold, harsh voice of an unknown entity, who claims to be visualising and relaying events through Alison’s unbelieving eyes, increasingly disturbed state of mind and growing feelings of paranoia. It certainly doesn’t take her long to work out why Guy is determined never to have a family of his own, although she probably wishes she had never discovered the reasons for that particular truth. The narrative is assertive, complex and thankfully broken down into digestible chapters, which offered me space to re-group and draw breath every so often.
Multi-layered, textured and highly charged words imbued an all-pervading and invasively cloying atmosphere you could have cut with a knife, together with a latent and barely contained sense of danger concealed beneath the surface, which set the scene and tone of this storyline, from the first, to the very last word. Secrets upon secrets were revealed about how this reclusive family lived their lives just above the bar of respectability and hidden violence. Yet somehow, at the same time, through some outstanding nuances and shades of dark and light in the narrative and dialogue, author Kerry Hadley-Pryce surprisingly manages to turn this dour, depressing, claustrophobic manifestation, into an often poignant, emotional and evocative work of fiction, although one which is totally devoid of even the smallest hint of levity or spontaneity.
There is a wonderfully considered and authentically drawn cast of characters, who literally to a person, made my skin crawl. I wouldn’t have trusted any one of them and, as it transpires, I would have been quite right not to do so. Complex, lugubrious and almost morbidly morose, never at peace with themselves and prone to volatile outbursts, they blended invisibly into their surroundings, making them almost as one with the fabric of the place.
For an ‘armchair traveller’, such as myself, who has only the vaguest notion of what areas might constitute the Black Country, Kerry uses the full palette at her disposal to paint a wonderful picture of a physical landscape which can be as beautiful and inspiring, as it is overwhelmingly dark and dreary, just as though time had stood still in a place that man forgot.
In Kerry’s own words:
“Try Googling ‘map of the Black Country’ and see what you get. Confused, is what you get. It’s neither North nor South, city or countryside. It is a place without borders. And, see, that’s the point: an important aspect of the Black Country is that it is borderless, unmappable, maybe a little bit weird, a little bit exclusive. People argue about where, or what, it is, and that is part of its unique identity”
So, there we have it. I was taken to a place I didn’t want to be, to meet people I didn’t want to be with and to learn things I didn’t want to know. Having been scared out of my wits, I was only too happy to make my escape relatively unscathed. But perversely, I loved every minute of it!
What always makes reading such a wonderful experience for me, is that with each and every new book I read, I am taken on a unique and individual journey, by authors who fire my imagination, stir my emotions and stimulate my senses. This story definitely had the power to evoke so many feelings, that I’m sure I won’t have felt the same way about it as the last reader, nor indeed, the next.
...
Guy Flood and his partner Alison, are driving up the M5 towards the Black Country. Guy is returning to his roots for the first time in many years. However, for him this is not a journey he wanted to make, particularly given the circumstances, to attend the funeral of his twin brother, Ivan.
Alison knows little of Guy’s past, as when she first met him, he was homeless, living on the streets and in quite a bad way, both mentally and physically. In recent times, they have both been working at the offices of the same newspaper, where Guy has risen from journalist to the position of editor and Alison is one of his reporters.
They have faced nothing but delays in their journey and tempers are getting a little frayed around the edges as Guy nears his destination. With Alison desperately trying to keep a secret from him, knowing full well that she shouldn’t really be making such an arduous journey and feeling worse by the minute, both of them are pleased when the end of their trek is in sight.
Being a ‘southerner’, Alison doesn’t know what to expect from Guy’s home, as he has only told her that he lived on a farm. She certainly isn’t prepared for neither the remoteness, nor the condition of the property and its meagre stock-holding. But bad first impressions are only set to become more shocking when she sees the inside of the building and meets the rest of Guy’s family – His sister Donna, his father Flood, the hired help Greebo, and baby Ivan, who seems to have been visited upon Donna as if by divine intervention and appears to Alison, to be badly neglected. Just to freak Alison out even more, Ivan’s body is lying in an open casket in the parlour.
The pair had planned to drive up, attend the funeral and then head back home, all in the same day. However, somehow, Guy had got the day of the funeral mixed up and it now turns out that they will have to stay overnight. Despite their protestations, Flood insists they stay in the squalor of the farmhouse, with no hot water or heating and the threat of a compulsory purchase order hanging over the rest of the building which hasn’t already fallen into ruination.
Whether it is Guy himself who confides in Alison, during that, the longest, strangest night of her life, about some of the terrible things events which made him leave his past behind him and has made him determined that he should never father children, or whether the unseen voice of the narrator is a tangible entity, it never becomes clear. However, little by little Guy appears to revert to his former self, as he begins to become as one with his surroundings and is almost imperceptibly drawn back into what remains of his disparate, morbid family. The old Guy, she discovers, isn’t one she really likes and the past never really has a habit of staying in the past, if you stir the pot too deeply.
When, as she is nosying around Ivan’s room, Alison discovers a rough bound copy of a book, written by his brother Guido (Guy) Flood, titled simply ‘God’s Country’, which she takes with a view to reading it, to try and understand what makes this man of hers tick. But will she ever get the chance to follow through, or even to make good her escape?
...
Oh, My Goodness! The second book in a row where the ending has left me hanging, lost for words and not able to form a single coherent thought – How much do these authors think a reader can take?
I have no idea what has just happened to me. I feel as though I have been transported to the darkest place of my worst nightmares, swallowed up and trapped in twenty-four hours of time that stood still, chewed up until I have had all the feelings and emotions sucked out of me, then spat back out and expected to get on with my life.
I know that I have just finished reading an amazing, very bold and chilling work of literary and societal fiction, with more than a passing nod to the undertones of horror I experienced, and which was simply begging to be devoured in a single reading session. However, I also realise that my journey of terror and disbelief will stay with me for a very long time and that it will probably take me every one of those precious moments to process the experience.
This was a short story of less than two hundred pages, which seemed to go on forever and yet, when the time came, I didn’t want to be over. I wanted, no needed, a definitive outcome, written down for me in black and white, so that I might possibly attempt to understand my mental torture. But that was not to be… and so I continue to wonder and speculate!
Told in the cold, harsh voice of an unknown entity, who claims to be visualising and relaying events through Alison’s unbelieving eyes, increasingly disturbed state of mind and growing feelings of paranoia. It certainly doesn’t take her long to work out why Guy is determined never to have a family of his own, although she probably wishes she had never discovered the reasons for that particular truth. The narrative is assertive, complex and thankfully broken down into digestible chapters, which offered me space to re-group and draw breath every so often.
Multi-layered, textured and highly charged words imbued an all-pervading and invasively cloying atmosphere you could have cut with a knife, together with a latent and barely contained sense of danger concealed beneath the surface, which set the scene and tone of this storyline, from the first, to the very last word. Secrets upon secrets were revealed about how this reclusive family lived their lives just above the bar of respectability and hidden violence. Yet somehow, at the same time, through some outstanding nuances and shades of dark and light in the narrative and dialogue, author Kerry Hadley-Pryce surprisingly manages to turn this dour, depressing, claustrophobic manifestation, into an often poignant, emotional and evocative work of fiction, although one which is totally devoid of even the smallest hint of levity or spontaneity.
There is a wonderfully considered and authentically drawn cast of characters, who literally to a person, made my skin crawl. I wouldn’t have trusted any one of them and, as it transpires, I would have been quite right not to do so. Complex, lugubrious and almost morbidly morose, never at peace with themselves and prone to volatile outbursts, they blended invisibly into their surroundings, making them almost as one with the fabric of the place.
For an ‘armchair traveller’, such as myself, who has only the vaguest notion of what areas might constitute the Black Country, Kerry uses the full palette at her disposal to paint a wonderful picture of a physical landscape which can be as beautiful and inspiring, as it is overwhelmingly dark and dreary, just as though time had stood still in a place that man forgot.
In Kerry’s own words:
“Try Googling ‘map of the Black Country’ and see what you get. Confused, is what you get. It’s neither North nor South, city or countryside. It is a place without borders. And, see, that’s the point: an important aspect of the Black Country is that it is borderless, unmappable, maybe a little bit weird, a little bit exclusive. People argue about where, or what, it is, and that is part of its unique identity”
So, there we have it. I was taken to a place I didn’t want to be, to meet people I didn’t want to be with and to learn things I didn’t want to know. Having been scared out of my wits, I was only too happy to make my escape relatively unscathed. But perversely, I loved every minute of it!
What always makes reading such a wonderful experience for me, is that with each and every new book I read, I am taken on a unique and individual journey, by authors who fire my imagination, stir my emotions and stimulate my senses. This story definitely had the power to evoke so many feelings, that I’m sure I won’t have felt the same way about it as the last reader, nor indeed, the next.
April 17, 2023
This review will read and sound a lot like my 5 star review of Hadley-Pryce’s debut, The Black Country. And that’s not a bad thing. Not at all. When I read that book, it completely stunned me. Left me with all the questions, and then all the silence; trying to come to terms with what I’d just read.
God’s Country rendered me (almost) speechless and stunned, just like the author’s previous books. When I got to the end (which seemed to take forever, yet no time at all), all the air in my lungs came flooding out, and “Oh my God!” right at the end of exhalation. I didn’t think I’d been holding my breath.
I’ve said it before. I’ll say it again. There’s nothing quite like a Kerry Hadley-Pryce book. The style is completely unique. The story is suggested (thanks to the implicating tone of lines such as, “she’ll tell you that” or, “you try and imagine that”.), rather than told, by the narrator. Who that is, well, that, reader, is for you to decide.
And, to end it all, Hadley-Pryce knows how to pen a cliffhanger. My word, doesn’t she just. You’ve just read of a family, so disjointed, so troubled, so pitiful. You’ve just filled your heart and head with some seriously grim life-stories. You’ve stayed up, probably later than you really should have, flicking the pages fervently, racing to the end, and then BAM! (Or BOSH! if yow spake Black Country) - that ending! Wow!
I’m not shy to say that I’m a Hadley-Pryce fan-girl of the highest order, and the reason for that - her words and how she writes them. She truly is a master wordsmith and one of my all time favourite authors.
God’s Country rendered me (almost) speechless and stunned, just like the author’s previous books. When I got to the end (which seemed to take forever, yet no time at all), all the air in my lungs came flooding out, and “Oh my God!” right at the end of exhalation. I didn’t think I’d been holding my breath.
I’ve said it before. I’ll say it again. There’s nothing quite like a Kerry Hadley-Pryce book. The style is completely unique. The story is suggested (thanks to the implicating tone of lines such as, “she’ll tell you that” or, “you try and imagine that”.), rather than told, by the narrator. Who that is, well, that, reader, is for you to decide.
And, to end it all, Hadley-Pryce knows how to pen a cliffhanger. My word, doesn’t she just. You’ve just read of a family, so disjointed, so troubled, so pitiful. You’ve just filled your heart and head with some seriously grim life-stories. You’ve stayed up, probably later than you really should have, flicking the pages fervently, racing to the end, and then BAM! (Or BOSH! if yow spake Black Country) - that ending! Wow!
I’m not shy to say that I’m a Hadley-Pryce fan-girl of the highest order, and the reason for that - her words and how she writes them. She truly is a master wordsmith and one of my all time favourite authors.
August 16, 2023
scratched an itch. in writing style and in the concepts explored. wish I'd read it whilst I was writing my diss on George Shaw.
March 2, 2023
This is an intriguing, hypnotic novel, very dark and utterly compelling. On one level it could be seen as an exploration of individual agency within a neglected and degenerate environment, on another as a study of internal loss, along with the effects of displacement. Does the environment of our formative years always own us in some way?
Kerry Hadley-Pryce is a remarkable writer – you would rarely come across such a distinct, persuasive voice. In this, as in her previous novels, she shows an uncanny ability to track psychological process, to portray it as vivid and dramatic, and in doing so to engage the reader, to disturb them and yet at the same time invite their empathy.
The God’s Country of the title is a fictional portrayal of the geographical area known as the Black Country, rendered here in dystopian form by a writer who clearly knows it intimately. The setting is portrayed as a stark, dominant force, as much a presence as any character. The protagonists are beholden to it: it impregnates their speech, their actions, their very way of being. They exist in a circumscribed world in which change will only occur through external pressure. Despite this, much about them remains elusive, hidden, possibly even unformed: the collective and individual self emerging as a shapeshifter, obstinately defying our scrutiny and understanding.
In essence this is a story of returning: of how a homecoming can reclaim the one who has gone away, perhaps return them to an earlier form of themselves, perhaps deprive them of what they had become whilst elsewhere. As it unfolds, the narrative is both described by an unseen narrator and observed by a participating character simultaneously, creating a dichotomy of doubt and possibility in the reader’s mind. Everything is subjective, open to interpretation, making for an enigmatic and deeply compelling effect as the story, very slowly, unfolds. I suspect the method of narration is original – I have certainly never come across anything like it – and there is a mantra-like quality to the language that involves and entangles the reader as each page turns and a little more is revealed.
In my opinion this is an outstanding book and Kerry Hadley-Pryce is an outstanding writer. If you like dark, suspense-driven fiction, or simply first class contemporary storytelling, I can’t recommend it highly enough.
Kerry Hadley-Pryce is a remarkable writer – you would rarely come across such a distinct, persuasive voice. In this, as in her previous novels, she shows an uncanny ability to track psychological process, to portray it as vivid and dramatic, and in doing so to engage the reader, to disturb them and yet at the same time invite their empathy.
The God’s Country of the title is a fictional portrayal of the geographical area known as the Black Country, rendered here in dystopian form by a writer who clearly knows it intimately. The setting is portrayed as a stark, dominant force, as much a presence as any character. The protagonists are beholden to it: it impregnates their speech, their actions, their very way of being. They exist in a circumscribed world in which change will only occur through external pressure. Despite this, much about them remains elusive, hidden, possibly even unformed: the collective and individual self emerging as a shapeshifter, obstinately defying our scrutiny and understanding.
In essence this is a story of returning: of how a homecoming can reclaim the one who has gone away, perhaps return them to an earlier form of themselves, perhaps deprive them of what they had become whilst elsewhere. As it unfolds, the narrative is both described by an unseen narrator and observed by a participating character simultaneously, creating a dichotomy of doubt and possibility in the reader’s mind. Everything is subjective, open to interpretation, making for an enigmatic and deeply compelling effect as the story, very slowly, unfolds. I suspect the method of narration is original – I have certainly never come across anything like it – and there is a mantra-like quality to the language that involves and entangles the reader as each page turns and a little more is revealed.
In my opinion this is an outstanding book and Kerry Hadley-Pryce is an outstanding writer. If you like dark, suspense-driven fiction, or simply first class contemporary storytelling, I can’t recommend it highly enough.
January 6, 2025
I've always enjoyed dark horror books, let it be gouls or a haunted house, some ghost or a gore killerspree... the more chills and thrills, the better. Surprisingly, none of the usual suspects are present in this novel and yet, it is one of the darkest and scariest books I've ever read.
It started with reading the superb Lie of the Land, harrowing in its very own right and maybe even just a tad more frightful. It introduced me to the very peculiar language the author uses, which adds to the nightmarish feel of the story. And I understand it won't be for everyone, I needed some time to get into it as well. But if you are willing to take a chance, this author will rip you inside out and leave you wondering what just happened.
Because nothing is as it seems in the Black Country. The horizon always seems to be off kilter, the light falls differently, the people say words they should say or maybe you didn't hear it right. Acts happen, but maybe it was just your imagination, a trick of that light. It is a nightmare where you desperately want to wake up from. And just as with Lie of the Land, I had to take small breaks from reading, just to get my bearings and to settle the terror back to some bearable uneasy feeling.
The author's voice is unique, and her storytelling comes out of a dark subconscious pit, and I am looking forward to reading her other books. But with moderation, and maybe I'll include some light reading first.
It started with reading the superb Lie of the Land, harrowing in its very own right and maybe even just a tad more frightful. It introduced me to the very peculiar language the author uses, which adds to the nightmarish feel of the story. And I understand it won't be for everyone, I needed some time to get into it as well. But if you are willing to take a chance, this author will rip you inside out and leave you wondering what just happened.
Because nothing is as it seems in the Black Country. The horizon always seems to be off kilter, the light falls differently, the people say words they should say or maybe you didn't hear it right. Acts happen, but maybe it was just your imagination, a trick of that light. It is a nightmare where you desperately want to wake up from. And just as with Lie of the Land, I had to take small breaks from reading, just to get my bearings and to settle the terror back to some bearable uneasy feeling.
The author's voice is unique, and her storytelling comes out of a dark subconscious pit, and I am looking forward to reading her other books. But with moderation, and maybe I'll include some light reading first.
March 9, 2026
When Guy Flood returns to his family home in the Black Country with his girlfriend Ali, it reopens familial wounds. His twin brother Ivan has died, and there is a funeral to be attended. Alison gains an insight into the secrets of the family's past, and it's darker and more harrowing than she ever believed it could be.
I've read the author's previous novels, and enjoyed them greatly, but this one might just be the best so far. It's a short read - only 141 pages - but the uneasy story and rich atmosphere left me wanting more (in a good way). Perhaps the writing style might take some readers a bit of getting used to, but it definitely adds to the unsettlingly ambiguous tone of the novel, and perfectly suits the narrative. Within a few pages you will have fallen in step with the rhythm. The landscape is almost a character in itself, and there are some lovely lyrical passages of prose. Every line is dripping with tension, and the characters are well-drawn and distinct. The dialogue is outstanding. The story might be viewed as being a little bleak and grim, but it is entirely appropriate in the context of these characters and their place in this world. These people are haunted, but not by ghosts in the usual sense.
God's Country is an excellent short novel, and well worthy of your time. Highly recommended.
I've read the author's previous novels, and enjoyed them greatly, but this one might just be the best so far. It's a short read - only 141 pages - but the uneasy story and rich atmosphere left me wanting more (in a good way). Perhaps the writing style might take some readers a bit of getting used to, but it definitely adds to the unsettlingly ambiguous tone of the novel, and perfectly suits the narrative. Within a few pages you will have fallen in step with the rhythm. The landscape is almost a character in itself, and there are some lovely lyrical passages of prose. Every line is dripping with tension, and the characters are well-drawn and distinct. The dialogue is outstanding. The story might be viewed as being a little bleak and grim, but it is entirely appropriate in the context of these characters and their place in this world. These people are haunted, but not by ghosts in the usual sense.
God's Country is an excellent short novel, and well worthy of your time. Highly recommended.
December 31, 2025
I call Kerry's writing Black Porridge.
The events in the book unfold over 48 excruciating hours, with the gossipy omniscient narrator filling out some jarring back stories that may or may not have relevance to the present. The atmosphere in the few locations used- car interior, farm exterior & interior, pub interior, OMINOUS AF Black Country exterior, is as thick as, well, er, porridge.
The few principle characters are so well drawn you can smell them. Flood, especially, is one of the scariest people I've encountered in a book.
I read this whilst winter holidaying on the Welsh coast, and the glorious walks on the beach, blessed with sunshine and widescreen mountain valleys, provided a very weird and unsettling context for the dark and dank claustrophobic sweat of Kerry's novel, which I read only when it fell dark.
The events in the book unfold over 48 excruciating hours, with the gossipy omniscient narrator filling out some jarring back stories that may or may not have relevance to the present. The atmosphere in the few locations used- car interior, farm exterior & interior, pub interior, OMINOUS AF Black Country exterior, is as thick as, well, er, porridge.
The few principle characters are so well drawn you can smell them. Flood, especially, is one of the scariest people I've encountered in a book.
I read this whilst winter holidaying on the Welsh coast, and the glorious walks on the beach, blessed with sunshine and widescreen mountain valleys, provided a very weird and unsettling context for the dark and dank claustrophobic sweat of Kerry's novel, which I read only when it fell dark.
August 6, 2023
A Black Country lad (and his West country wife) returns home after many years for his twin brother's funeral, finding a borderless land of amorphous meaning, the soil and sky infecting its people with shades of grey, the tale told by an omniscient and clearly unreliable narrator, as dark history is recounted and recanted, and the land rises to claim its fold.
Hadley-Pryce is an astonishing author, one with a vivid and particular voice, wholly confident and multifaceted, and in this tale the landscape becomes a character in the best tradition of MR James and Nigel Kneale, while remaining truly unique.
Hadley-Pryce is an astonishing author, one with a vivid and particular voice, wholly confident and multifaceted, and in this tale the landscape becomes a character in the best tradition of MR James and Nigel Kneale, while remaining truly unique.
March 14, 2023
This is the third novel I've read by Kerry Hadley-Pryce. An immensely talented author, Hadley-Pryce creates an atmosphere so viscous you could stir it! I felt like I was right there in the room, feeling the rising tension between the characters. Add to that brilliant dialogue and descriptions of place and mood, and a spreading claustrophobic darkness, and you have another top-class novel.
November 11, 2023
I actively have no idea as to what happened in this book. There is a strong chance that nothing did happen. I am not insinuating that this is a bad book; the prose is beautiful, and Hadley-Pryce has a way of unnerving you through the simplest of means, however, the lack of a steady plot makes it a bit difficult to invest in. The holding back of 'secrets' was really the only thing keeping my going (and to be honest the reveals were slightly disappointing). Additionally, the continued repetition of 'she would say' and 'if you asked her' makes the read slightly tiring.
All in all, I am glad I read this book as I got to experience Hadley-Pryce's fantastically unsettling descriptions, but I will not be recommending it <3.
All in all, I am glad I read this book as I got to experience Hadley-Pryce's fantastically unsettling descriptions, but I will not be recommending it <3.
May 18, 2025
Excellent. The heir to Joel Lane
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