Lockdown bubble trouble

Kiwi crime star JP Pomare delivers another icy thriller with an ingenious twist.

- GREG FLEMING

HOME BEFORE NIGHT, by JP Pomare (Hachette, $37.99) 

JP Pomare's prodigious output continues - Home Before Night is his sixth novel in five years and, like 2020's Tell Me Lies, was first published as an Audible original.

It's another icy, twisted tale, which takes place amid Covid-like lockdowns in Melbourne, this time focusing on a mother's love for her adult son.

Our narrator, Lou, is a single mother who has been laid off from her airport border control job because of the pandemic. She's suffering from depression, drinks too much and has a rather creepy relationship with her only son, who lives with her. She also has a complicated relationship with her ex- a man who has moved on and started a new life and family, but to whom she is tied by past incidents.

Lou is smart and articulate but damaged - "secrets grind you down over time", she observes at one point- and she has more than her fair share on her conscience.