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Sally Diamond has always been considered odd, and for the 20-something years of her adulthood she has largely been a recluse. Her mother died around the time she reached adulthood, and her father has raised her ever since. As he approaches his death, he tells her she could just put him out with the trash: no need to make a big fuss. When she takes him seriously, taking him out to the barrel where they incinerate garbage to take care of his body, Sally is thrust into the spotlight.
That’s certainly not a place she wants to be. But some old family friends come to her aid, and they encourage her to seek for some more normalcy in her life: to make friends, socialize, find a job she would enjoy. It’s a challenge, but Sally takes it seriously and does what she can to follow their advice.
Despite the police investigation into her disposal of her father’s remains, and the unwanted public attention, Sally finds herself enjoying some satisfaction in her progress. The attention, however, includes a few pieces of mail from a mysterious stranger on the other side of the world who clearly knows about her early life. It not only brings up the past —apparently a traumatic childhood she remembers absolutely nothing about — but makes her fear for her present.
Strange Sally Diamond is a novel with a narrator many may consider autistic (though the character’s psychiatrist father tells her she is not, as it so happens). She trusts no one, has no close relationships, and is not good at reading signals or communicating in typical ways. She isn’t sure if she knows what it is like to love. But she is largely satisfied with her life.
When her past is dug up, though, this unusual woman is forced to face learning about and perhaps remembering horrific events, even as the reader starts to learn about them as well. The details about that past are delivered one section, one chapter, at a time, and the book becomes something different than it seems at first. Then, as mysterious people enter the picture, it becomes a suspense story. The past is intruding on the present, and indeed the reader isn’t sure what the future will hold.
I found Strange Sally Diamond to be an unusual mix of psychological drama and suspense, with a touch of thriller. It was interesting to see Sally evolve and grow, and then to see a parallel story from the past become ever more important to the present-day plot. All told, I’m a bit on the fence about how I felt about it. The crime(s) in the book are disturbing though the details are not overdone. The conclusion is thought-provoking. Not sure if I’d read it again knowing all I know at the end.
Rated: High. Profanity includes 13 uses of strong language, around 20 instances of moderate profanity, about 5 uses of mild language, and 30 instances of the name of Deity in vain. Violence includes frequent references to the past, where a girl was kidnapped, imprisoned for years, and regularly raped and mistreated.
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