A Slow Fire Burning

Product Information

There was an opportunity here. She'd had that thought when she first realized who the boy was, but she'd not known how best to take advantage. Now that he was dead, however, it felt as though this was all meant to be. Serendipity. Laura, a young woman who suffered a traumatic brain injury when she was ten, is the prime suspect in the murder of Daniel, a young man who is found dead on his houseboat. Laura’s mother had been having an affair with a man who left their house and hit Laura on his drive home. Her mother had run out to the accident and urged the man to run away so that she would not get caught cheating. Laura spent three months in a coma and then underwent a series of painful surgeries to rehabilitate her body, which never fully recovered. When she got out of the hospital, her mother left her father and Laura felt abandoned and angry. As an adult, Laura worked at a laundromat and had extreme emotional and mental problems, including poor impulse control. The night before Daniel died, she met him at a bar and slept with him. In the morning, he called her a gimp and they got into a physical fight that ended with her biting him. He left the boat and she went home, stealing his watch, but then someone else murdered him. Because of her involvement with him, Laura became the prime suspect in the detective’s case. A Slow Fire Burning twists and turns like a great thriller should, but it's also deep, intelligent and intensely human.”– Lee Child A heartfelt memoir about race, identity and mental illness. Read by the actor himself, it makes for moving listening. Who killed Daniel and why? I found it ambitious in that each character had reasons to be the murderer, depending upon the chapter. Each character endured tragedy and trauma; each has a suspicious pedigree. No one is an unreliable narrator, yet in reflecting their pasts, we wonder what the truth is. Each of us are a bit of unreliable narrators of our past, or, I should say we “color” our past to reflect what we want. What Hawkins is great at, is exposing the “shady” parts, or the “grey”.

The central character is Laura who is a hot mess. “It’s not my fault” is her motto. As the story opens, she is seen leaving a houseboat in the early hours of the day the man who occupies the houseboat is found dead. Laura is carrying more emotional baggage than is imaginable. She’s not the only distressed female in the story. Miriam finds the dead body of Daniel, and through the story, the reader learns of her horrid past. Carla is the aunt of Daniel, and she is a grieving mother whose young son died tragically. Theo is Carla’s ex-husband; he is an author and a bit of a slippery character. Hawkins provides a map of the neighborhood with the homes of the different characters. I referred to that map often.Angela is Carla’s sister, living a lonely and unhappy life. She lived with her son Daniel until recent years when Daniel went to live on his own. They had a caustic, unhealthy relationship. I love Paula Hawkins, and this is why— A Slow Fire Burning twists and turns like a great thriller should, but it's also deep, intelligent and intensely human . . . the characters are just like people you know . . . or maybe even just like you yourself. Hawkins is proving herself a worthy 21st century heir to Barbara Vine and Patricia Highsmith.”— LEE CHILD A Slow Fire Burning twists and turns like a great thriller should, but it's also deep, intelligent and intensely human.” – Lee Child The story navigates between tragedy and redemption, making for a powerful and thought-provoking read.

She hesitated, then nodded. "He had a visitor. A couple of times, perhaps? It's possible he might have had more than one visitor, but I only saw the one. A woman, older than he was, closer to my age, perhaps in her fifties? Silver-gray hair, cut very short. A thin woman, quite tall, I think, perhaps five eight or nine, angular features . . ." A Slow Fire Burning is an engrossing narrative that expertly captures the complexities of human relationships. From the author of The Girl on the Train and Into the Water comes another read-it-in-one-night thriller.. .[ A Slow Fire Burning] proves that revenge is actually a dish best served hot, simmering and smoldering.” — Town & Country I was expecting a big surprise, a major twist and I suppose it is here. But the reason I frame it in this way is that it came and went before I’d realised that that's what it was. I can’t say it was an explosive moment for me and that’s perhaps because there are many minor twists here and this one sort of melded in with the crowd. In retrospect it did explained things, it was the moment all should have become clear in my mind (as I’m sure it will in the minds of more switched-on readers).

Need Help?

The book revolves around the gruesome scene of Daniel's death occurring on a London houseboat he was living in. There are numerous characters seen leaving the crime scene reportedly by his nosey neighbor Miriam, who has a side story of her own tying the Twist and turns and complicating who did it. The author sets in motion a number of scenarios and vindictive reasons to commit the crime. A Slow Fire Burning is the latest from Paula Hawkins, the woman whose words haunt your dreams. . .We follow three women close to the deceased—an ex, an aunt, and a neighbor. Each has kindled a hot-burning anger against the man in question, and Hawkins happily fans the flames.” — Glamour it also features a mystery novelist character who gives a little meta-commentary on the genre as well as roadmap to the novel itself:

The following version of this book was used to create this study guide: Hawkins, Paula. A Slow Fire Burning. Penguin Random House, 2021. Kindle. The first half of the book would have easily been rated a 2 or 3 stars, just average if not a bit overly complex. However, the last half of the book was extremely entertaining and had some twists that I was not quite expecting. At the last half of the book, it was revealed why the book was so complex.

Listen to Paula Hawkins on the Penguin Podcast

There’s a great sense of suspense and tension. The story gets more engrossing as it goes along. This is a book where I was shaking my head in amazement/disgust at several points. It’s deliciously twisty and just when you think everything has been resolved, there’s one more twist waiting. Miriam is a middle aged woman, living just several boats down from the boat where Daniel is brutally murdered. She sees, hears and knows a lot. She also has a vendetta against at least one of the characters. A Slow Fire Burning is an excellent example of how literature can be used to explore difficult topics with grace and sensitivity.