“Despair is a weird thing, the way it can come over you in a scarlet wave, making you scream and sob and curse the world; or it can just freeze you on the spot, deprive you of all the energy and purpose, tear your soul away from you and leave.”
Take Me Home by Daniela Sacerdoti is an amalgamation of genres from romance, to tragedy, to supernatural. Set primarily in Scotland, the story follows London book editor, Inary Monteith, as misfortune draws her back to her small Scottish hometown of Glen Avich. When Inary was a little girl she discovered she had ‘the sight’, an ability to see spirits, which is passed down through the women in her family. At thirteen she lost ‘the sight’ in a terrifying ordeal on the loch in Glen Avich, but now it looks like it might be back…
Although it is written from multiple perspectives, with different chapters narrated by different main characters, the majority of the story-telling is done through Inary’s inner monologue, enabling a more consistent style and becoming a necessity when Inary loses her voice. The carefully created characters gently tug on your heartstrings as you get to know them through their individual chapters, and the many secondary plot lines twist and turn elegantly with the main discourse.
Thanks to Sacerdoti’s easy-to-read style the actual words on the page blend away as you are transported into the characters’ world, as if Inary were reading the story to you herself. This leads to a wonderful emotional roller coaster as you ride the waves of grief, fear, hope and love, finishing the book feeling like you’ve experienced it all first-hand.
The story is relatively short at only 256 pages, but this doesn’t take away from its intense emotional power. It contains very little action, instead focusing on suspense and investigation, creating a sort of supernatural detective story, with a very short, sharp snap of action as the clues suddenly tie themselves together.
All in all, Take Me Home is a spooky, poignant portrayal of grief, love, and the sixth sense.