Such an Odd Word to Use: Secrets don't hide, they echo - Paperback

by Carl Goodwin (Author)

This unsettling psychological mystery follows Mark as he spirals into a state of paranoia after moving to a secluded house. Constantly feeling watched, he's forced to question what is real.

After years on the move, Mark believes he has finally found quiet: a secluded Clerkenwell house, once a music studio, tucked behind Georgian terraces. But small disturbances ripple - a glance held too long; a neighbour who seems to know too much; watchers hovering just out of frame - and a routine planning request appears to trigger a response too coordinated to be chance. Unease becomes vigilance.

Guided, unexpectedly, by Lana - the observant child next door whose hand-drawn map records what adults miss - and emboldened by chess moves with hidden meanings, Mark begins to trace faint threads: a misplaced notebook, failing technology, curious Dickensian figures, and a house with a past that resists being archived. In a city of doorbell cameras and polite surveillance, the line between caution and obsession thins. Is he being targeted - or reading patterns into noise?

Such an Odd Word to Use is a slow-burn psychological mystery - literary in tone, quietly propulsive - about neighbourliness, urban isolation and the stories we tell to feel safe. A novella for the digital age, where even silence may be scripted.

For readers of Jonathan Lethem, Paul Auster, Tana French and Louise Candlish.

'An atmospheric novella... creating an unsettled feeling that lingers after the final page.' - LoveReading, Indie Books We Love

'Smart slow burn of a London mystery, with lively puzzles and literary heft.' - BookLife Reviews, Editor's Pick