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The Well, by Catherine Chanter
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One night is enough to swallow a lifetime of lives.
When Ruth Ardingly and her family first drive up from London and view The Well, they are enchanted by a jewel of a place. But the locals suspect foul play in its verdant fields and drooping fruit trees, and Ruth becomes increasingly isolated as she struggles to explain why her land flourishes whilst her neighbours' produce withers and dies.
Fearful of envious locals and suspicious of those who seem to be offering help, Ruth grows less and less sure whom she can trust.
- Sales Rank: #204134 in Audible
- Published on: 2015-07-02
- Released on: 2015-07-02
- Format: Unabridged
- Original language: English
- Running time: 946 minutes
Most helpful customer reviews
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful.
a brilliant debut.
By Cloggie Downunder
“Elsewhere, people were squeezing the last six months into small spaces: bicycles onto the backs of campervans, mattresses onto the roofs of cars, sleeping bags into recycled supermarket carriers, saucepans stacked one into another like Russian dolls, inflatable water carriers deflated. Set to music it would have been a grand chorus scene in an opera, with all the crowd and the minor parts working in unison and it seemed as though any minute they would all turn to face front and burst into song for their curtain call.”
The Well is the first novel by British short story writer and poet, Catherine Chanter. Ruth Ardingly is returned, under house arrest, to The Well, the lush rural property she and her husband, Mark have owned for over a year. The property is securely fenced, Ruth wears an ankle bracelet monitor and is guarded by three soldiers enforcing the Drought Emergency Regulations Act. How has their escape from the City (and the cloud of suspicion that hung over Mark) in the guise of a tree change, gone so horribly wrong?
As Ruth endures the boredom of her sentence, she thinks back on how it all started: the purchase, the rain that favours their idyll, the satisfaction of working towards self-sufficiency and the delight in presence of their grandson, Lucien. Ruth shares some of the memories with a young guard and with the priest who visits her. She tells of the jealousy and suspicion of neighbours, and the arrival of the Sisters of the Rose of Jericho with their charismatic leader, Sister Amelia.
Against the background of a severely water-restricted England, Chanter examines how relationships can break down under the effect of suspicion and increasingly differing priorities, the influence of religious cults and the tragic consequences that can ensue. She gives the reader a glimpse of online religion and the mass hysteria it can generate. This is a gripping drama that will have the reader wondering about the true fate of the young victim, and Ruth’s part in it, until the final pages.
Chanter’s characters are both credible and complex. Her descriptive prose is wonderfully evocative: “.. the thought of her is dries my mouth with hope and fear and thoughts, wild and screeching as crows at dusk, scattering into the darkness” and “Some, I guess, came simply to dip their toe in the rippling pond of drama in the otherwise flat surface of their lives” are just two examples. This thought-provoking novel is a brilliant debut.
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
More like a 3.5 stars -- still likeable in any case
By Yzabel
(Note: I got a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)
Another one for which I can’t decide on a rating. Because I did like it, but I wasn’t awed, and I was torn between moments of beautiful writing, and moments when said writing seemed to be here just to delay the outcome. The feeling was definitely weird.
I liked the tense, oppressive atmosphere of The Well: a place that looked like some kind of Promised Land in the middle of the Waste Land, yet also a tainted paradise, one that could only bring the sterility of death. I liked the contrast between the emphasis placed on a “land for women”, which could hint at more promises of life, but in the end, it was all a lie, and only ended with said life being stifled and denied the right to exist. As a container for such themes, this novel was good. Maybe not the most subtle piece of work in that regard, but good nonetheless.
I was less thrilled by the way it kept hesitating between what it wanted to be: a murder mystery, or a supernatural story? I wished for more information about the drought and about the mysterious quality of The Well. Was why that place so “blessed”? What made it exceptional? The blurb led me to expect some preternatural explanation, something that would have justified the way the Ardinglys were rejected almost like witches of old—by this, I mean an explanation more complex than jealousy and people wanting what they couldn’t have. It begged for a revelation that I never got, focusing instead on the mystery/murder aspect. I would have had less trouble with that if it had taken a definite stance regarding Ruth’s story of an isolated woman who doubts herself and seeks for a frightening truth: that story didn’t need the backdrop of a drought and miraculous land to be told. The Rose of Jericho, Ruth’s love life coming apart at the seams, Lucien’s story… Those could stand on their own.
The mystery highlighted all the doubts and shortcomings of human psyche. The charges against Mark in the beginning, how they contributed to add a “what if…” side to his character, poisoning other people’s minds against him, including that of his own wife. The Sisters, led by Amelia, the cult that got hold of Ruth’s mind. Angie, not the perfect mother, yet the loving one all the same, who had her faults but still tried to get better, only to have to face a “what if” of her own when it came to her son.
However, I found it too easy to guess who had committed the crime, and the way Ruth descended into her delusions seemed just a tad bit far-fetched. Maybe her isolation, getting estranged from her husband, could be a valid explanation; or maybe not. She didn’t strike me at first as someone who would fall so easily into the clutches of a cult. Still, this is part of the novel’s ambiguity: who can tell what kind of person is a “ready-made victim”? Nobody can. Sometimes you just can’t suspect at all, you never see it coming.
What was somewhat annoying, as said above, was how the novel beat around the bush. On the one hand, there were really beautiful, poetic moments, vivid descriptions that made The Well come alive, with its good sides and with its faults. On the other hand, I clearly had the feeling at times that the author was delaying, only to lead to revelations that weren’t so striking all in all. In my opinion, the book could have benefitted from more editing and shortening here.
I’d rate this 3.5 stars (depending on the scale used). Overall, I liked it, though I’m not sure I’d read it again.
12 of 15 people found the following review helpful.
One person’s paradise is another person’s perdition.
By Kelly Garbato
** Trigger warning for rape, pedophilia, and domestic violence. **
There is one last emotion, though, which I have not anticipated. I am feeling smug. There, you thought you were just guarding a middle-aged crank who had delusions of grandeur, but now you’ll have to think twice, smart-arse.
Rain, rain, go away. Come again another day. I dance like a witch doctor around the sitting room.
###
Determined to salvage her marriage – not to mention what’s left of her husband’s sanity – Ruth Ardingly agrees to trade in her London home for a small farm in the country. Hailing from a long line of farmers, it was always Mark’s dream to work the land, reveling in nature and solitude and self-sufficiency. Yet he forfeited these plans when, as a college student, he met and fell in love with Ruth – already pregnant from a one-night stand. Instead, he pursued a law degree, committed himself to Ruth and their daughter Angie, and settled for an ordinary, middle-class existence.
And then came the child pornography, discovered on his work laptop. Though Mark was investigated and eventually exonerated, that didn’t stop the harassment and social ostracization. So Ruth acquiesced, hoping that the change of scenery and fresh air would do them both a world of good. Perhaps it might have, had the move not come smack dab in the middle of a drought – a drought to which their new, thirty-acre paradise seems immune.
It’s a reliable water table, the real estate agent assures them. But once they get settled, Ruth and Mark come to realize that it’s so much more than this: not a night passes without rain at The Well, even if it’s just a light drizzle. And yet Ruth hardly ever sees the rain for herself; she just experiences it second-hand, through dew left on the morning grass, or puddles deposited in the drive come dawn. (Magic!) Meanwhile, the rest of the UK is ticking off the days since it last rained – and they’re well past the hundred mark.
As the drought drags on, resulting in rampant inflation, poverty, hunger, drug addiction, and social unrest, the world’s attention focuses on The Well. In a rerun of London, Ruth and Mark are shut out by their previously friendly neighbors; things quickly escalate from chilly behavior to outright violence, including the murder of their dog Bru. Accusations run the gamut: cheating, water theft, illicit chemicals, even witchcraft. What initially brought them together as a couple – the teamwork needed to get the farm up and running – soon threatens to tear them apart: Ruth begs Mark to abandon ship, while he holds tight to his dream. Isolated and lonely, Ruth begins to spiral into depression, while Mark finds solace on his plow – and at the bottom of a bottle.
Into this morass steps Angie; her five-year-old son Lucien; and the Sisters of the Rose of Jericho, led by the enigmatic and fervent Sister Amelia. Staying the summer with her adopted family of traveler friends, Angie introduces Ruth to the Sisters, who worship her as the chosen one – and The Well as paradise. A “feminist” reincarnation of Christianity, the Sisters believe that women are poised to inherit the earth, already spoiled by men, and infuse it with new life, as Ruth has at The Well. Amelia is well-positioned to further the wedge between Ruth and Mark – but her real rival proves to be Lucien, to whom Ruth plans to leave The Well.
When Lucien’s lifeless body is found floating in the pond, there’s no shortage of suspects: The angry townspeople. Grandpa Mark, the alleged pedophile. The Sisters of the Rose, whose religious teachings demand a Well free of/from men. Or Ruth herself, who by this time is caught in the throes of Amelia’s religious fervor and quite possibly delusional.
Fast-forward two months, to Ruth’s homecoming. Sent away after torching the Sisters’ caravan, she’s back – and determined to find out who murdered Lucien, even if that someone was her. Yet this won’t prove easy under the terms of her house arrest, and with The Well under government occupation. She enlists the help of a sympathetic guard and a retired military priest to help her learn the truth about those last, terrible days in paradise.
For a 400-page book, I’m surprised by how little I have to say about THE WELL. Usually I’m brimming with commentary – either positive or negative – but not so here. The story has promise, but ultimately failed to resonate with me.
I think the main problem is the sheer verbosity. This is a long book, and not in the awesome “OMG I hope it never ends!” kind of way. More like “Dear gods, WILL it ever end?”
I’m reminded of another recent read, S.K. Tremayne’s THE ICE TWINS, which I called “a wicked weird mashup of genres: ghost story, murder mystery, psychological thriller, and (oddly enough) nature writing.” Set on an isolated island off the coast of Scotland, Tremayne relies on descriptions of the physical environment – a dark, desolate winter landscape – to augment the atmosphere of the story. I’d characterize THE WELL in similar terms (minus the ghost story aspect), but here, I think the nature writing is to the detriment of the plot. While the prose is often lovely, it’s also excessive – too often we’re bogged down in lengthy, protracted descriptions, especially of the setting. Consequently, this slows down the action and detracts attention from the mystery. Which is an engaging one, I might add.
Of the main parts of the story – which for me consist of Ruth and Mark’s tumultuous marriage; the resentment harbored by the townspeople; the religion that springs up around Ruth and The Well; and Ruth’s search for the truth – it’s the early, more real-world events that I found most interesting: the townspeople. I’m a dystopia junkie, so this angle naturally grabbed my attention. So I was both surprised and disappointed when the police ruled out the townies as suspects almost right away, leaving only Ruth, Mark, and the Sisters (read: the nefarious Sister Amelia). This cut back on some of the tension and suspense, I think.
It also doesn’t help the “mystery” angle that Ruth is forced to carry out her “investigation” while under house arrest – confined to portions of her property (sometimes just the cottage), banned from using the telephone or Internet, and only allowed a small group of pre-approved visitors. She’s forced to guilt-trip her priest Hugh into Googling info during his down time and smuggling printouts to her in between relevant pages of the Bible. Not very captivating detective work, you know?
Also, I expected to find the Sisters’ misandrist religion a little more interesting than I did. I’m a feminist! I love playing on stereotypes that feminist hate men and flourish on their tears! (Hey! There’s a thought re: The Well!) But it just…meh. Didn’t do much for me.
Maybe it was the characters, none of whom I really felt a connection with or affinity for.
And what’s up with Hugh’s cow? Annalise is the last cow in England, and somehow she’s able to give perpetual milk. News flash: like all mammals, cows need to be kept pregnant in order to produce milk.
** I received a free electronic ARC for review through NetGalley. **
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