{"id":8124,"date":"2019-02-27T13:01:21","date_gmt":"2019-02-27T13:01:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8124"},"modified":"2019-03-12T11:12:40","modified_gmt":"2019-03-12T11:12:40","slug":"the-snakes-by-sadie-jones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8124","title":{"rendered":"The Snakes by Sadie Jones"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Published by Chatto & Windus 7 March 2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

448pp, hardback, \u00a314.99<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Click here to buy this book<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether or not the echo is intended, this latest novel by Sadie Jones recalls the subject matter of Fran\u00e7ois Mauriac\u2019s classic story about inheritance, Le Noeud de Viperes<\/em>. Atmospheric, suspenseful and very well calculated for a future screen version, The Snakes <\/em>looks at the damage caused by money-lust to the various members of a well-heeled London family, the Adamsons.<\/p>\n

Griff, the bullying father, is a magnate who made his money as a slum landlord.Liv, his brittle wife, has lived with a secret so corrupt that she repels her idealist daughter, Bea.\u00a0 Bea\u2019s brother, Alex, a recovering addict, has been parked in Burgundy, where he manages a semi-derelict hotel owned by his father.<\/p>\n

Bea and her husband Dan take time out from their inner-city jobs for a road trip to Italy, calling in on Alex en route<\/em>.\u00a0 They find a dismal scene. Alex has been faking entries in the guest-book, failing to get on with basic hotel maintenance, living in a daze. One of the few things he takes care of are the snake traps in the roof.\u00a0 Before Bea and Dan have time to take all this in, Griff and Liv arrive for what looks like a routine inspection.\u00a0 Soon, there is a fatal car crash, and then a murder enquiry.<\/p>\n

This is a novel full of mental as well as of physical violence, in which one man stands out.\u00a0 Griff\u2019s quick-fire put-downs of everyone around him are contemptuous, deliberately unmanning. The cold elegance and comfort of his expensive London home, his impeccable travel arrangements, his retinue of lawyers and fixers, are accompanied by the icy entitlement and easy cruelty of the self-made man.\u00a0 He has his own greedy secrets, too, and in the end these will bring the whole family down.<\/p>\n

Sadie Jones\u2019s first novel, The Outcast<\/em>, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize.\u00a0 Her second, Small Wars<\/em>, was longlisted for the Orange Prize. \u00a0Two others followed, The Uninvited Guests <\/em>and Fallout<\/em>.\u00a0 This is her first contemporary novel.<\/p>\n

With its graphic luxury and squalor, its scary characters and its grasp of psychology, The Snakes<\/em> looks ideal for development into a TV series comparable with The Killing<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/p>\n

This is a novel full of mental as well as of physical violence, in which one man stands out. Griff\u2019s quick-fire put-downs of everyone around him are contemptuous, deliberately unmanning. The cold elegance and comfort of his expensive London home, his impeccable travel arrangements, his retinue of lawyers and fixers, are accompanied by the icy entitlement and easy cruelty of the self-made man. He has his own greedy secrets, too, and in the end these will bring the whole family down […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8124"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8128,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8124\/revisions\/8128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}