One of Us Knows by Alyssa Cole

I would like to thank Harper260 and Random Things Tours for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – Harper360

Published – Out Now

Price – £8.99 paperback £5.99 Kindle eBook

Years after a breakdown and a diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder derailed her historical preservationist career, Kenetria Nash and her alters have been given a second chance they can’t refuse: a position as resident caretaker of a historic home. Having been dormant for years, Ken has no idea what led them to this isolated Hudson River island, but she’s determined not to ruin their opportunity.

Then a surprise visit from the home’s conservation trust just as a Nor’easter bears down on the island disrupts her newfound life, leaving Ken trapped with a group of possibly dangerous strangers—including the man who brought her life tumbling down years earlier. When he turns up dead, Ken is the prime suspect.

Caught in a web of secrets and in a race against time, Ken and her alters must band together to prove their innocence and discover the truth of Kavanaugh Island—and their own past—or they risk losing not only their future, but their life.

The unreliable narrator in fiction is when the character telling you the story isn’t quite telling us the real story. Often this is a character hiding a truth from us – The Murder of Roger Ackroyd giving us a great example. The second type is when more naturally our narrator isn’t quite seeing the whole picture as in Catriona Ward’s The Last House on Needless Street. I was however impressed by the unique spin on the unreliable narrator we have in Alyssa Cole’s new thriller One of Us Knows where our main character changes their entire personality throughout and they too are in a dangerous situation they don’t understand. It delivers a fascinating read that hurtles to a very interesting conclusion.

Kenetria Nash (better known as Ken) finds herself about to start a new job as a caretaker for the historic Kavanugh estate; a dilapidated stately home on a remote island in the treacherous waters of the Hudson River. The only issue is that Ken has no memory of applying for this – ken hasn’t been around for six years. Kenetria is an ‘alter’ among many others inhabiting the same body. This is due to Disassciative Identity Disorder (also known as DID). A person whose personality shifts to another of different age, gender and emotional states; often in some form of reaction to a situation. Ken is often felt to be the asshole of this system and has been often viewed as the outsider personality often not wanted by the rest. But now, Ken is the main personality having to find her way through her new role while her other alters either give information or worry that Ken will put them in danger thanks to her temper and reckless behaviour.  This island though has many dangerous secrets awaiting discovery.

Cole in the novel does mention how in many movies featuring this disorder are full of showy theatrics as an actor jumps from act to another but here the key is how much we get to see each of Ken’s alters as a real person and not performance. This is delivered through them taking over narration of the tale and making us feel they’re an older person or a child. The skill though Cole delivers in the story is not simply delivering one narrative voice taking over the story it’s the crucial inter-relationships between these personalities and how they work together/frustrate or sometimes scare each other. The reader is made to see each as there own person also get a glimpse of how life could be in the system that the selves have learnt to manage to keep themselves alive.

We have Ken who is a fascinating mix of loud in your face attitude masking an inner nervousness of being not in control of events and an awareness the other alters look down on her. We have the more silent Solomon who acts as the silent go-between but rarely presents themselves outwards to the world. Solomon is Ken’s possible only friend in the system of personalities while we also have the lovely four year old Keke who both has a lot of fear and a deep love of her alters while we also meet Empress  - a teenager more keen to watch anime than be out there in the world and Mesmer who focuses on the physical health and mental well-being of the system. Cole makes us see each person; hear a different voice and yet as we watch the interactions; how the personalities come to the fore and add skills and weaknesses with each one we see both one person and the multitudes within them. Kenetria is unique and most of all as we get to know her we care very much what the sutra ion we see unfurl is.

Cole has delivered a modern gothic feel with the remote island this is set on. We are also set in the period of the slow recovery after the pandemic and Cole makes us recall he nervousness of meeting strangers again and there is a weird isolating feeing starting from the off as Ken alone goes on the boat to the Island and told worrying stories about its history. This is a place rumoured once to have goblins. Add in the mysterious gatekeeper Celeste that Ken meets and desperately flirts with there is a feeling this story is set in a place where if something bad happens no one will come soon to help especially as the inevitable dark and stormy night begins.

Because the story needs us to accept who Ken and the alters are first, it does take a little while before the main plot commences but when it does things hurtle along in the second half of the book. The mysterious trustees of the island show up and we start to notice how much this place resembles the castle that the alters ‘live’ in within Kenetria’s mindscape. We get an intriguing mystery of Ken’s connection to the place and while that goes on within ken’s mind scale things are going wrong with various alters going silent and vanishing from the other’s sight. There are psychological stresses at play and revelation after revelation start to be found often linking back to Ken. We swing from a modern psychological thriller right into modern gothic horror served swiftly with gusto and a smattering of death, blood and violence. This tale does have darker themes of abuse being uncovered but it’s also about recovery which again means as we are so invested in Ken we want to see the daylight break and also some explanations for all these events.

One of Us Knows is a unique ride of a thriller. Cole should be praised for giving us such a different main lead or in this case lead. It was not easy to guess where the story led us and ultimately very hard not to cling on tight and await things to be explained. A dark and suspenseful read but definitely a good one! Highly recommended!