"Summerwater" by Sarah Moss

An audio book

Several couples and families are staying in log cabins at a holiday camp by a loch. Some have rented for a fortnight, others own their places. It rains all day. Chapters from a character's PoV (first or third person) are separated by short sections from the PoV of nature - a deer with a fawn afraid of wolves, etc. The character's thoughts wander. They watch each other through windows. One is an obsessive jogger. She's not had sex with her husband for 2 or 3 weeks and thinks perhaps she should - it's like oiling a bike chain: it may not be much fun, but it stops things falling off. She might have a dodgy heart. A teenage girl has flirted with suicide - a friend of hers was hospitalised. A girl wonders which sense she can make people distrust - touch, if she mentions fleas; sight if it's dark

The different characters sometimes live in the same cabin so we see events/characters from 2 viewpoints. In a restricted environment away from home comforts, the characters have thoughts in common -

• Mobile reception is poor and WiFi's only available at the pub.
• There was loud music from a cabin the night before from Rumanians or something, which angers several of the characters.
• They should go abroad more, where it rains less
• Toilets aren't very private
• Gender/family roles become more obvious

In the final short interlude we revisit the aspects of nature previously covered - badgers, deer, ant-hills, etc - noting how they respond to noise. When, in the final chapter, one or two people go over to the cabin of supposed foreigners who are having a party, a fire soon breaks out. There's interaction between the guests which has been largely missing before. The jogger goes to the pub to call 999, but too late - it seems that there are deaths. Arson? the music stops.

I didn't find the daydreaming boring - the sections were sufficiently short, and there was just about enough variety of character. But equally, I wasn't knocked out.

Other reviews

• Melissa Harrison (Moss’s ability to conjure up the fleeting and sometimes agonised tenderness of family life is unmatched ... Observing the way we subtly edit ourselves and one another – the limits that puts on us, as well as the strengths it creates – is Moss’s metier.)
• Dana Hansen (The final paragraph of Summerwater is one of the most chilling in recent memory, pointing to the devastating consequences of bigotry and hatred, and to the undeniable mastery of Moss’s storytelling.)