Title: Fear
Author: Dirk Kurbjuweit
Publisher: Orion

[Synopsis]

YOU’D DIE FOR YOUR FAMILY.
BUT WOULD YOU KILL FOR THEM?
***
Family is everything.
So what if yours was being terrorised by a neighbour – a man who doesn’t listen to reason, whose actions become more erratic and sinister with each passing day? And those you thought would help – the police, your lawyer – can’t help you.
You become afraid to leave your family at home alone. But there’s nothing more you can do to protect them.
Is there?

[My Review]

This is a slow burning, atmospheric novel which I enjoyed but found a little too slow at times.
The writing itself is great; Dirk Kurbjuweit conjures up a real sense of unease around their neighbour, and the threat level is realistic enough that you can imagine it actually happening. At times the novel is really immersive and at those points I felt myself drawn into the story. Unfortunately, this didn’t often last for long as the story switches between modern-day and the past, and I found the stories about Randolph’s past to drag on a bit.
I was definitely expecting more of a tense, ‘thriller’ style story and Fear really isn’t. I think this is more an issue around the marketing and synopsis; to me I definitely felt it made the book seem like it fits more into a thriller genre but in actual fact it is much more about narrator Randolph and his childhood/ adult life leading up to the event which takes place at the start of the book. I found some of the descriptions quite interesting but overall I just felt a bit frustrated because I wanted to get back to the here and now. There was a lot of info that I felt just didn’t advance the story at all, or even provide any useful information in reading it, and so I found myself losing interest a bit.
The story is still fairly interesting, and some parts really intrigued me, but it just didn’t hold my attention properly unfortunately.

[Rating: 3/5]

Many thanks to the publisher, Orion, for providing a copy of this novel on which I chose to write an honest and unbiased review.

Fear is out in the UK on 25 January.

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