THIS IS THE WATER

This is the water; it consumes and guides the lives of the characters in this novel. This is the bustling, chlorine-infused swim facility; a killer swims unnoticed among his future victims here. This is the swim team; these are the girls with shy breast buds who compete against the clock. These are the swim parents who get up at 5am, carry their sleeping children to the car, and drive them to ‘out of town' swim meets. This is the swim mom, Annie, whom we follow in her domestic routines, laced with mundane comfort. Annie, who yearns for her best friend's handsome husband, Paul. This is Paul, who once went for a drive with a nurse named Bobby Chantal. Annie imagines Bobby with a smooth, curvy body under her hospital whites. And this is where the story takes its first unpredictable turn.

Bobby Chantal was found with her throat slit, neck split, like an open Pez dispenser.

Annie's mounting yearning plunges the novel into the dark psychological undercurrents of placid family life: this is Annie washing her thinning hair, noticing that the flesh around her face feels looser. This is her husband, Thomas, who is oblivious to Annie's growing concern that they no longer touch. This is Annie, the swim mom who might be too old, too unappealing to even be a serial killer's victim. But if her family is at risk, she is fit enough to kill.

This is award-winning Yannick Murphy's extraordinary new novel.