Freya Barker has done it again with an engaging, emotional and generally "un-put-downable" read! Cruel Water will put you through the wringer, but the anger and crumpled tissue pile are well worth it.
If you have read From Dust, you will remember Viv as the beautiful bartender at The Skipper who found Syd in the alley behind the pub and gave her a chance to get her life back on track. By all outer appearances, Viv is the epitome of self-sufficiency but she has painful past we can't even begin to comprehend. The glimpse we received in From Dust only scratched the surface of the pain, loneliness and devastation she tries to hide from everyone.
Viv's story broke my heart over and over again with each new revelation of the horrible things she endured over the past few decades. From the outside looking in, her family was the picture perfect group that others wanted to be a part of, but like most pictures of perfection, that facade crumbles when it is inspected too closely. Once Viv left home and her overbearing group of 4 brothers, she experienced a horrific marriage that broke her even more on both an emotional and physical level. Although she eventually found the strength to escape, she has never shared her experiences with her family and she doesn't know where she falls on the scale of 'victim' to 'survivor' some days. She has let some of her friends in on a limited basis, but she has built steel walls around her heart to keep anyone from getting too close now.
Then one day a beautiful dark haired stranger sits at her bar, and for the first time in far too long, she actually FEELS something when she looks in those captivating grey eyes. With a painful guilt-ridden past of his own, Ike is a wanderer, but he has roots in Portland and he is finally starting to feel the urge to stick around one place for a change. He bought a house that has been renovated and is almost ready for him to move in, he has some acquaintances in the area like Skipper regular and softball team member Tim, and the gorgeous blonde bartender calls to him like a siren after just one night together - and he has absolutely no idea what to do with that. He can see that Viv is feeling the same pull but it scares the hell out of her, and after being warned off by several of her friends including Tim and Gunnar, he knows he has tread carefully but he is willing to take his chances.
I fell in love with Ike right alongside Viv. He is a natural protector and becomes a pillar of strength for her to lean on, but he never tries to take over her life or make decisions for her unless she absolutely needs him to step in. He stands back and lets her fight her own battles, but he is standing behind her both literally and figuratively the whole time ready to jump in if she needs him. He knows she has fought hard to be rid of overprotective and overbearing men in her life and values her hard won independence, and he respects that.
From the start of the book, events are set into motion that inevitably bring all of Viv's secrets out into the open and the emotional overload threatens to finally completely break her, but Viv is made of stronger stuff than that. After so many years of denial and trying to push down the memories into a little box, the emotional release is overwhelming to say the least leading to a few scary moments for Viv and her friends as they try to figure out how to help her. Fortunately she has a wonderful support system in Ike, Syd, Gunnar and the Skipper family, and they prove that the family you choose is just as important (if not more so) than the family you are born into with their unquestioning acceptance of her revelations even as they hate those experiences for her. So many times I wanted to reach into the pages of my Kindle and either throat punch or shake one of her brothers or her mom until they came to their senses- UGH! Viv's counselor friend and therapist Pam is an absolutely wonderful supporting character with just the right amount of straight talk, humor, attitude, and compassion to keep Viv rooted in reality and to help them all navigate the emotional minefield that has become Viv's life.
Speaking of supporting characters, I have to say this book is filled with very well written characters who are not perfect, just perfectly flawed. They react in ways that may make you angry or annoyed, but those reactions are absolutely real. Denial is always easier than acceptance, and letting anger flow is a necessary step to reach acceptance for everyone involved no matter how much their initial reactions may hurt. As much as I wanted to smack her family, they had just come face to face with the reality that their history was being re-written in an unexpected and painful way, and where Viv has lived with years of that reality, they needed to work through that new knowledge in stages on their own.
If you haven't read From Dust, you can absolutely read Cruel Water as a standalone. But if you love a book that will make you feel, definitely grab both of these wonderful novels and set aside some time to dive in because once you start reading, you won't want to stop.
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Emerging from the deepest waters....like a boss
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 5, 2016