tamaranth | 2026/016: Nowhere Burning

2026/016: Nowhere Burning — Catriona Ward

"We're here because we want to understand them, right?"
"Right."
"Not because we are them. Not because it wants us here... You know what they say. Nowhere draws lost kids to it. Are we lost kids too?" [loc. 2044]

Riley and her little brother Oliver live with Cousin. Their mother committed suicide a couple of years before the novel opens: Riley never knew her father, while Oliver's father is dead. Now Riley is biding her time until she can graduate from high school and escape Cousin's brutal regime.

One night a girl in green appears at her second-floor window, and gives Riley directions to Nowhere, an abandoned and ruined mansion that used to belong to famous film star Leaf Winham. Now, years after Winham's death and the fire that destroyed the house, Nowhere has become a sanctuary for runaway children, the lost and unwanted and abused.

Oliver is only seven, and he's starting to believe the things that Cousin says: that there's a demon inside both of them, that they need to starve it out. Riley knows she's run out of time: so she takes Oliver and flees into the Rocky Mountain National Park. Turns out Nowhere is indeed a sanctuary, with a broken ferris wheel in the grounds of the house, with teenagers hunting and fishing and planting while the younger children play. It's an idyllic life and Riley finally starts to relax.

It's not only Riley's story. She is one of three protagonists, and probably (at least to start with) the most compelling. There are also chapters focussing on Adam, an architect employed by and drawn to Leaf Winham, and Marc, a documentary maker who's fascinated by the stories of Nowhere. How, and why, all those stories tie together is only clear in the final few chapters, though there are plenty of subtle hints at connections.

Beside the obvious elements of Peter Pan -- lost boys and girls, a crocodile named Tinkerbell, the fear of growing up -- there are aspects of the story that bring to mind Michael Jackson, and The Lord of the Flies, and the darker aspects of fairytales. Ward's writing continues to impress me immensely, as does her ability to describe emotional states and responses without ever approaching them directly. There are some dark -- though never gratuituous, never too explicit -- scenes in this novel, but I feel that it's ultimately hopeful: that even the broken and damaged can help one another, that forgiveness can be granted as well as earnt, that kindness matters.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance review copy, in exchange for this full honest review. UK Publication Date is 19 FEB 2026.