An exhilarating, gripping new psychological thriller from the author behind the record-breaking, multimillion-copy bestseller, The Silent Patient. This is a tale of murder. Or maybe that's not quite true. At its heart, it's a love story, isn't it? One spring morning, reclusive ex-movie star Lana Farrar invites a small group of her closest friends for a weekend away, on her small private island, just off the coast of Mykonos. Beneath the surface, old friendships conceal violent passions and resentments. And in forty-eight hours, one of them will be dead. But that was just the beginning ... You may think you know this story. Think again.
Chapter One
This is a tale of murder.
Or maybe that’s not quite true. At its heart, it’s a love story, isn’t it? The saddest kind of love story – about the end of love; the death of love.
So I guess I was right the first time.
You may think you know this story. You probably read about it at the time – the tabloids loved it, if you recall: ‘MURDER ISLAND’ was a popular headline. Unsurprising, really, as it had all the perfect ingredients for a press sensation: a reclusive ex-movie star, a private Greek island cut off by the wind…and, of course, a murder.
There was a lot of rubbish written about that night. All kinds of wild, inaccurate theories about what may or may not have taken place. I avoided all of it. I had no interest in reading misinformed speculation about what might have happened on the island.
I knew what happened. I was there.
Who am I? Well, I am the narrator of this tale – and also a character in it.
There were seven of us, in all, trapped on the island.
One of us was a murderer.
But before you start laying bets on which of us did it, I feel duty-bound to inform you that this is not a whodunnit. Thanks to Agatha Christie, we all know how this kind of story is meant to play out: a baffling crime, followed by dogged investigation, an ingenious solution – then, if you’re lucky, a twist in the tail. But this is a true story, not a work of fiction. It’s about real people, in a real place. If anything, it’s a whydunnit – a character study, an examination of who we are, and why we do the things we do.
“As for the dead, I trust you’ll grant me artistic licence regarding their interior life.”
What follows is my sincere and heartfelt attempt to reconstruct the events of that terrible night – the murder itself, and everything that led up to it. I pledge to present you with the plain unvarnished truth – or as near to it as I can get. Everything we did, said and thought.
But how? I hear you ask. How is it possible? How can I possibly know it all? Not just every action taken, everything said and done – but everything undone, unsaid, all the private thoughts in each other’s minds?
For the most part, I am relying on the conversations we had, before the murder, and afterwards – those of us who survived, that is. As for the dead, I trust you’ll grant me artistic licence regarding their interior life. Given I am a playwright by trade, I am perhaps better qualified than most for this particular task.
My account is also based on my notes – taken both before and after the murder. A word of explanation regarding this. I have been in the habit of keeping notebooks for some years now. I wouldn’t call them diaries, they’re not as structured as that. Just a record of my thoughts, ideas, dreams, snatches of conversations I overhear, my observations of the world. The notebooks themselves are nothing fancy, just plain black Moleskines. I have the relevant notebook from that year open now, by my side – and will no doubt consult it as we proceed.
Extracted from The Fury by Alex Michaelides, out now.
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