Reunion at Red Paint Bay [Paperback]

I just finished this book and was sorry to have it end. This is a not only a tense psychological suspense novel, that keeps you turning the pages to find out what happens next. But it's also a very thoughtful exploration of the fine line between guilt and innocence. The writing is crisp and sparse, which sets a perfect tone for this story that begins with seemingly ordinary people in a ordinary town until secrets from the past reveal that nothing and nobody in Red Paint, Maine is what they seem to be. I'm going to suggest this novel for my book club (there's a lot here to discuss). I also checked out the author's website and discovered this book was optioned for a movie in France. That's very cool, but I hope it comes with subtitles.

I get the impression that some people are not too excited about this book. When I first picked it up, I didn't expect to be giving it a five-star review. This is no idyllic novel about summer in a small town in Maine. As the blurb says, it's also not really a mystery or thriller. What it is is a great psychological novel that digs deep into sensitive subjects. Rape must be one of the most traumatic issues on the planet. As I'm writing this, there have been two horrific gang-rapes in India that made world news. I worked for years as a rape crisis counselor, so I do know the subject from Amy's viewpoint. I was really impressed that a male author could present the subject, which most people don't like to think about, from multiple points of view and do it so well. Sex crimes, more than other offenses, seem to make getting to the actual truth more difficult. Persons who are really victimized are often not believed. Persons who make false accusations are sometimes believed. Amy mentions feminist Catherine MacKinnon, who says the truth is what the woman believes is happening. Simon's character (and David's) cast doubt on this. They think the woman consented. All of this theory ignores the fact that men can also be raped, but the book didn't treat this issue. Simon tells his son near the end of the book that it's better to tell the truth. We never really know what the truth is. What if Paul was lying about everything in his marriage? What if Jean was lying about being forced to have sex? What if Simon has been lying to himself all these years? This is a book I'll be thinking about for a long time.

Simon Greenleaf Howe, owner and editor of the Red Paint Register, has been living in rural Red Paint, Maine, for most of the twenty-five years since he graduated from high school there. With his wife Amy, a psychiatric therapist, and his eleven-year-old son Davey, Simon enjoys the bucolic environment and his ability to run his own life and job. So little happens in Red Paint, in fact, that Simon is thinking about a new tagline for the Register: "Nothing Happens--and We Report It." But something has happened, and something more is about to happen, not just the high school's 25th Reunion, which is scheduled in a few weeks, but a threat to Simon's own life related to events that occurred twenty-five years ago.

When Simon receives his first mysterious postcard from Salt Lake City, he does not think much about it. Soon after, however, he receives five more postcards from around the country, none of them signed, gradually hinting at some terrible deed that Simon committed in the past. Simon has no idea what it is. The cards continue to arrive, and Simon and Amy become more stressed and more impatient with each other. The final postcard is hand-delivered to the family's mailbox with a message demanding that Simon meet the sender on the dock below the local inn during the 25th reunion celebration.

Harrar slowly ratchets the tension up to the breaking point, in part by eventually giving the sender of the cards his own point of view, allowing him to make his case to the reader and giving context to Simon's crime. By the time the last card is delivered, its writer has been in Red Paint for a couple of weeks. He has discovered and visited Simon's house at night. He has approached Davey, the eleven-year-old son. He conducts hidden stake-outs outside the house, and he has created tension and even some hysteria within the family.

A few red herrings keep the reader off guard, but eventually, the stalker states exactly what he wants - and Simon's simple confession to the unknown crime is not going to be enough: "Confession," the stalker says, "isn't really a penalty. In fact, confession can be good for the soul - it absolves the confessor. What I think is that a [betrayer] should feel what it's like to be [utterly betrayed] himself." Their eventual meeting is full of surprises, extending the long-term consequences of Simon's initial betrayal from twenty-five years ago well into the future. Author Harrar raises significant questions here about betrayals, their immediate and long-term consequences, and whether one can atone for wrong-doing if s/he does not recognize it as wrongdoing at the time. And what about someone whose sole goal in life is vengeance? What options are open to him for a healthy life? What about those lies which actually improve life, instead of destroying it? In fact, how much truth is really necessary, and how much guilt and inner remorse are needed to atone for misdeeds? Ironies abound here in this suspenseful study of universal themes of guilt, innocence, punishment, atonement, and absolution as seen through the seemingly simple life of a hitherto respected man in Red Paint Bay.