The Birdcage

This moody psychological thriller from Chase (The Daughter of Foxcote Manor) opens in January 2019, when three half-sisters, Kat, Flora, and Lauren, are summoned by their eccentric artist father to his picturesque Cornish summer cottage for a surprise announcement. The sisters spent idyllic summers on the coast with their father when they were young, but they’ve avoided one another since the summer of 1999, when a tragedy tore the family apart. Now finally thrown together again, Kat, Flora, and Lauren are forced to deal with their involvement in a horrendous event that has overshadowed their lives for 20 years. The tension ramps up when they realize that someone is watching them—someone who knows what they did. Chase does a good job depicting family relationships, and while it’s hard to like some of the deeply flawed characters at first, as their individual stories unfold, the reader can’t help empathizing with even the most vile of them. Exquisite prose and an evocative setting compensate for a buildup that leads to not so many surprises and not much of a payoff. Those who value style over story will best appreciate this. Agent: Lizzy Kremer, David Higham Assoc. (U.K.) (July)