Purity And Punishment

This deeply creepy debut novel about an isolated family is shockingly self-assured.

- Catherine Woulfe

I remember being a child and stum-bling across a book that was different, significant. It was Lord of the Flies. The magic happened again in third form when we were assigned The Handmaid’s Tale. And when Jack Lasenby wrote Calling the Gods, I dived in for two days, emerging changed and reverent.

This is what reading The Water Cure felt like. Every word is stitched into place with care and intent. Turn the tapestry over and even the back would be neat.

It is short, timeless and, for a debut, quite shockingly self-assured: it seems like a story that has always been and will always be, and Welsh-born Sophie Mackintosh is simply the one who put it on paper.