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Content snapshot
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Violence
Some
Some thriller violence; the antagonist's plan involves real danger
Language
Barely any
Mild language
Sexual Content
Barely any
Brief adult content
Substance Use
None
No substance use
Emotional Intensity
A lot
Psychological menace built carefully over the novel; the sense of class, belonging, and obsessive grievance
What this book is about
St. Oswald's Grammar School has a new boy under a new name — someone with a deep and patient grievance against the school and one teacher in particular. Veteran classics master Roy Straitley narrates the present; the intruder narrates his own past. Joanne Harris's psychological thriller is brilliantly constructed, using its dual timeline and unreliable narrators to build toward a genuinely surprising conclusion.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
Psychological thriller menace
Boarding school setting
Class resentment themes
Reader Verification
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