book review a noise downstairs

Book review: A Noise Downstairs

As the years and best-sellers roll on, Toronto crime author Linwood Barclay just keeps getting more inventive and fearless.

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Over the course of his now-18 books, the former Toronto Star columnist has often explored unusual crises among middle-class families confronted with crimes that threaten one or more of their members.

Book review: A Noise Downstairs Back to video

Then over several linked books, he created the entire town of Promise Falls, and its intersections of journalists, cops, academics and some very strange, sometimes criminal residents.

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And now, in A Noise Downstairs, he creates the last word in unreliable narrators, in the process launching readers into 350 pages of unease and doubt. This is almost literally crazy stuff, the kind of anxious work that could irritate readers, but instead manages to be thoroughly engaging, if in a highly twitchy sort of way.

Paul Davis is the primary narrator, and he’s unreliable for a reason. Eight months back the college teacher stumbled on colleague Kenneth Hoffman attempting to dispose of a pair of women’s plastic-wrapped bodies, and got his head whacked with a shovel. Only the serendipitous arrival of a cop prevented him from becoming a third corpse.

Now Hoffman is in prison, having pleaded guilty to murdering two women with whom he’d been having affairs, and to attempting to murder Paul. In the intervening months, Paul has been seeing both a therapist and a neurologist, trying to get his brain and his life back on track.

But he has extended lapses of memory and troubled thoughts, although his wife Charlotte, a realtor, mainly shows him the best support he can expect, and his old college pal Bill, another realtor, pops into his life now and then to buck him up.

The downstairs noise of the title is one many people wouldn’t recognize any more – typewriter keys click-clacking in Paul’s home office. He’s had a notion that writing an account of his encounter with Hoffman will help him heal, and as a symbolic stimulus, Charlotte has bought him an antique Underwood.

But what a torment it becomes.

The trouble – one trouble – is that before the murders to which Hoffman confessed, the two women had to type notes about their own regrets and guilt. The instrument used: Hoffman’s old typewriter. Now, Paul starts being wakened in the night by the sounds of his Underwood’s keyboard, and when finally he decides to roll paper into the typewriter, what he finds are notes that sound as if the women are trying to tell him something.

Of course this is madness.

Or something else.

With the hesitant support of his therapist, Paul visits Hoffman in prison, in an effort to understand what motivated the murders, and possibly to get rid of whatever fantasies – or realities – are taunting him via not only his own mind, but the Underwood.

What he finds is a shrunken shell who in this state is more puzzling than helpful.

In the circumstances, there are natural tensions in Paul’s marriage as he tries to decipher whether something weirdly supernatural is happening or if there’s a more sensible explanation for the mysterious messages that just keep coming.

One obvious possibility is that Paul himself is typing them in some sort of fugue state – a suspicion that further rocks his reliability as the person narrating the tale.

All this creates a jitteriness that goes beyond the usual questions, guesses and deductions that capture readers of most crime novels.

There are false leads and misdirections, all magnified by Paul’s dodgy mental state – and finally there are conclusions that are not only surprising and satisfying, which would be enough for any good crime novel, but radical, too. Once again, Barclay has given his skills a good push, and while he’s at it, gives readers one, too.

Joan Barfoot is a novelist living in London

A NOISE DOWNSTAIRS

By Linwood Barclay

Penguin Random House, $25.95

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Book review: A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay

Linwood Barclay is one of my go-to authors, so I’ll snap up any book he releases. Recently I’ve been enjoying his Promise Falls series , but this is a standalone and – though elements are kinda ‘guessable’ – it’s still twisty and most definitely a great read. 

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s "normal" existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, desperate to cheer him up, brings home a vintage typewriter—complete with ink ribbons and heavy round keys—to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write. However, the typewriter itself is a problem. Paul swears it’s possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails. Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. The killer had made his victims type apologies to him before ending their lives. Has another sick twist of fate entwined his life with the killer—could this be the same machine? Increasingly tormented but determined to discover the truth and confront his nightmare, Paul begins investigating the deaths himself. But that may not be the best thing to do. Maybe Paul should just take the typewriter back to where his wife found it. Maybe he should stop asking questions and simply walk away while he can. . . .

When I say some of the twists here are predictable I don’t mean they’re telegraphed….. it’s more that they’re really the only answer. It seems unlikely but if something looks like a horse painted with stripes…. it’s not necessarily a zebra. Ummm… I think I was going for some donkey analogy there but lost track part way through.

Anyhoo… Paul is a great protagonist and likeable lead. We meet him but briefly before his near-death experience and then after, while he’s still recovering and share his distress as he seems to be forgetting things and – worst still – imagining them. Or is he?

And then there’s Anna, Paul’s therapist. She’s dealing with her father who’s slipping into dementia. In his moments of clarity he’s the man she remembers but they don’t last long and she’s struggling to keep her personal and professional lives separate. (And yes, I know Paul is married and there’s that whole patient / doctor thing but I liked the burgeoning overtures of romance between the pair….)

I suspect I liked Paul as he’s a lover of logic – as am I. He needed to understand why his former colleague and friend could suddenly go from a womanising but affable bloke to one who wantonly murdered his lovers and attempted to kill a man he’d been mentoring.

Similarly Paul thinks there must be some other reasons for the things he’s experiencing now. Although as I’m not a fan of the fantastic, I didn’t go down the ghostly path he ventured towards.

So, though I kinda guessed the bits and pieces I did not see the ending coming. I was rather sad about part of it. “Noooooo!” I wanted to scream. But didn’t. Of course the whole comeuppance / karma thing means most of the characters here didn’t escape unscathed.

Another great read-in-one-sitting, A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay will be published in Australia by Hachette and available from 10 July 2018.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review. 

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Home » Thrillers » A Noise Downstairs

A Noise Downstairs

ON SALE NOW

ABOUT THE BOOK

Buy the book, about the book.

An Indie Next Pick for August

A Barnes & Noble Best New Mysteries Selection 

One of Crime Reads Most Anticipated Summer Crime Reads and Thrillers

The  New York Times  bestselling author of  No Time for Goodbye  returns with a haunting psychological thriller that blends the twists and turns of Gillian Flynn with the driving suspense of Harlan Coben, in which a man is troubled by odd sounds for which there is no rational explanation.

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s “normal” existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, desperate to cheer him up, brings home a vintage typewriter—complete with ink ribbons and heavy round keys—to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write.

However, the typewriter itself is a problem. Paul swears it’s possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails.

Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. The killer had made his victims type apologies to him before ending their lives. Has another sick twist of fate entwined his life with the killer—could this be the same machine? Increasingly tormented but determined to discover the truth and confront his nightmare, Paul begins investigating the deaths himself.

But that may not be the best thing to do. Maybe Paul should just take the typewriter back to where his wife found it. Maybe he should stop asking questions and simply walk away while he can….

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“Linwood Barclay’s novels – as intelligent as Michael Connelly’s, as compelling as Harlan Coben’s – never fail to astonish.  A Noise Downstairs , his best work yet, is a cobra of a story: smooth, slippery, unnerving … and likely to strike when you least expect it. I devoured this book.”  –A.J. Finn, author of the #1  New York Times  bestseller  The Woman in the Window

“One of the world’s finest thriller writers on the top of his game, this novel is a blinder, his best yet.”  –Peter James, author of the Roy Grace novels

“Vintage Barclay – an utterly compelling read with a twist you won’t see coming. I loved it!”  – Shari Lapena, author of  The Couple Next Door

“ A Noise Downstairs  will astound, confound and thrill you. You’ll need to read it with your wits about you and you’ll want to sleep with your eyes open afterwards. A masterful novel.”  –Gilly Macmillan, author of  What She Knew  and  The Perfect Girl

“[A]rtfully crafted . . . Don’t turn your back on any of these guys.” – New York Times Book Review

“[Barclay] does a masterful job of layering on the mysteries until we’re almost frantically turning the pages, impatient to find out what the hell is going on. A beautifully executed thriller.” – Booklist (starred review)

“[A] fast-paced psychological thriller . . . Barclay carefully conceals hidden motives and secret lives until the startling conclusion. Harlan Coben fans will find much to like.”  – Publishers Weekly

“Prepare to be blindsided by an ending you didn’t see coming. Barclay’s nerve-wracking tale will have readers scared to close their eyes at night.”  – Library Journal

“[A] twisty psychological tale . . . a satisfying and clever novel. The large cast and the story’s many moving parts perfectly set the reader up for the final climactic twist.”    —Mystery Scene

“Proving that Barclay is a master of manipulation, he pulls a genuinely unexpected twist that throws everything revealed up to that point entirely out the window. This thriller then kicks into high gear as it becomes a race for answers and justice. The author has cast this novel with a group of realistic characters that add to the festivities showcasing a grand design. Predictable becomes unpredictable in this compelling book that echoes the best of Harlan Coben.” –  Associated Press

“A creepy and compelling standalone.. Barclay expertly weaves together the various plot strands to reach a wholly unexpected conclusion.” – The Guardian

“cunning.. twist-packed” – Sunday Times

“The king of the thriller returns with this spooky tale of a man recovering from serious trauma who starts to hear noises in the night.” – The Independent

“With a tight plot, delivered in short, punchy chapters, it’s hard to resist racing through – to the final twist.” – Sunday Mirror

“Barclay has written 18 novels, none as infernally creepy as his latest book.”  — Toronto Star

“Barclay cranks up the suspense, putting a tight cast of characters and promising plot twists into play.  — Canada.com

“Barclay’s latest thrillers mixes a whole bunch of red herrings and left-field twists into one satisfying summer read.” — Readers Digest

The Canuck master of suspense returns.” – Zoomer

BOOK TRAILER

A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay (Review by Lara Ferguson)

Rating: 3.6/5*

Take a trip through the mind of a man who is going crazy.  That is exactly what happens in A Noise Downstairs . Paul is going crazy…or is he?  From the beginning scene, Linwood Barclay grabs the reader’s attention, moving from a horrific crime scene, to the aftermath and one victim’s attempt to move past the trauma to a more normal life, seemingly with the support of his friends and family.  Circumstances quickly get more complicated as Paul, our protagonist, begins to hear things and forget things….or does he?  With the help of his therapist, wife and best friend, Paul sets out to dig to the bottom of the problem, whether it’s mental or supernatural.

Barclay keeps the twists and turns coming, as we follow Paul through this process all the while trying to figure out for ourselves what is going on.  Is he crazy?  It’s hard to decide until the very end.  The suspense is very well done indeed.

This book is a great read until the very end when it feels a little like Barclay just got tired of writing and decided to tie up all the loose ends.  Once we arrive at the last few chapters, it becomes very predictable and not as much fun, but the story itself is well worth the read.  You may think you have figured it out, but then the story twists upon itself again and you have to dispose of your theory.

Check it out on Amazon

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Featured Review

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s "normal" existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, brings home a vintage typewriter to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write. However, Paul swears that it is possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails. Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago.

A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay

• Publication Date: April 30, 2019
• Genres: Fiction , Psychological Suspense , Psychological Thriller , Suspense , Thriller
• Mass Market Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow
• ISBN-10: 0062906127
• ISBN-13: 9780062906120

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Theatre | music | books, book review: linwood barclay – a noise downstairs.

Linwood Barclay

A Noise Downstairs

Hardcover: 368 pages

Publisher: Orion

ISBN-10: 1409163989

ISBN-13: 978-1409163985

12 July, 2018

RATING: *****

Linwood Barclay has stepped, almost literally, into the unknown with his breathtaking new novel, A Noise Downstairs . A novel packed with pace, psychological puzzlement and tense, gripping drama, here is a novel guaranteed to have you ignoring the light for awhile.

Paul Davis forgets things – he gets confused, he has sudden panic attacks. But he wasn’t always like this. Eight months ago, Paul found two dead bodies in the back of a co-worker’s car. He was attacked, left for dead, and has been slowly recovering ever since. His wife tries her best but fears the worst. Therapy helps during the days, but at night he hears things – impossible things – that no one else can. That nobody else believes. Either he’s losing his mind – or someone wants him to think he is. At the end of the day, just because he’s paranoid doesn’t mean it’s not happening.

This is Barclay at his best. Davis isn’t a man we may particularly like as a person, but nevertheless the author manages to embody him with such an intense sense of helplessness we cannot help but be on his side. His therapist, Anna White, is also a deliciously drawn character who has a depth and personality that’s as credible and flawed as she is compassionate and hard edged.

The plot is eked out by degrees, increasing the tension word by word until, finally, the denouement arrives and we as voyeurs for over 300 pages, are left breathless. Yet it is Barclay’s marvellous grip on dialogue which really makes A Noise Downstairs sing. Light mixes with dark as well as incredulity mixes with revelation and in Linwood Barclay’s hands the conversations truly pick up and reduce the pace fabulously well.

A Noise Downstairs is a superb novel. A tense, wonderful tale that strikes just the right note right the way through so as to keep even the most adept reader guessing.

Review: A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay

By kristin centorcelli.

A Noise Downstairs

Linwood barclay.

July 24, 2018

A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay is a haunting psychological thriller in which a man is troubled by odd sounds for which there is no rational explanation.

Linwood Barclay is considered tops when it comes to small-town thrillers, and I can certainly understand why after reading A Noise Downstairs —a sly little chiller that takes place in the charming seaside town of Milford, CT. The setup is certainly creepy: West Haven college professor Paul Davis is driving home one night when he notices a car in front of him that he recognizes. It’s a big, blue Volvo that’s as recognizable as its owner, Paul’s colleague and mentor, Kenneth Hoffman. Kenneth seems to be driving erratically, weaving around and swerving over the middle line.

Worried for his friend, Paul follows the Volvo and witnesses Kenneth throwing something into a dumpster then setting off again. When Kenneth pulls to the side of the road, Paul stops too, planning to offer his help. He doesn’t count on finding the bodies of two women wrapped in plastic in the back of Kenneth’s car. And Kenneth didn’t count on being caught trying to bury them out in the middle of nowhere. Surprised, Kenneth smacks Paul upside the head with a shovel. He doesn’t kill him, though, and eight months later, Kenneth is in prison and Paul is coping with the aftereffects of, well, being hit really hard in the head with a shovel—including headaches, horrible nightmares, and losing time.

On a positive note, things seem to be getting back on track with his real estate agent wife, Charlotte. He’s seeing a psychologist, Dr. Anna White, but he feels like there’s something more he can do to help his recovery, so he asks her advice on an idea he has:

“Instead of trying to put all this behind me, I want to confront it. I want to know more. I want to know everything . About what happened to me. About Kenneth. I want to talk to the people whose lives he touched. And not just in a bad way. The good, too. I want to understand all the different Kenneths. If it’s possible, I’d like to actually talk to him, if they’ll let me into the prison to see him. And if he’ll see me, of course. I guess what I’m searching for is the answer to a bigger question.” Anna tented her fingers. “Which is?” “Was Kenneth evil? Is Kenneth evil?” “I could just say yes and save you the trouble.” She took in a long breath, then let it out slowly. “I could go either way on this. Do you honestly think it will help?” Paul took a moment before answering. “If I can look into the eyes of evil in the real world, maybe I won’t have to run from it in my sleep.”

Charlotte seems to be on board with the idea, sort of. She just wants Paul to get better. When she brings home an antique Underwood typewriter and sets it up in his tiny office, Paul is thrilled. Charlotte explains that while he may not be able to write on it—citing problems finding ribbons and such—it could prove to be an inspiration. What Charlotte couldn’t know is that it’s the same sort of typewriter that Kenneth forced the two women he killed to type out notes on before he slit their throats. It was never recovered, but certainly it’s a coincidence. Paul starts to wonder more about coincidence and other things when—soon after the typewriter arrives—he starts to hear strange sounds in the night.

It was just after two in the morning when he heard the sounds. He became aware of them while he was still asleep, so when he first opened his eyes, and heard nothing, he thought he must have been dreaming. There was nothing. But then he heard it again. Chit chit. Chit chit chit. Chit. Chit chit. He immediately knew the sound. It was a new one to the household but instantly recognizable. One floor down, someone was playing with the antique typewriter in his cramped office.

Immediately, Paul suspects his nine-year-old son Josh—who is visiting from his mother’s—of playing with it, but when he gets down there, there’s no one at the typewriter. The only thing Paul can do is chalk it up to bad dreams. But when it keeps happening, he grows increasingly desperate, driving him to take more risks in talking to the people that Kenneth knew, including the husbands of the women he killed—women with which he’d been having an affair. Meanwhile, Dr. Anna White is dealing with her elderly father, who lives with her, and a patient named Gavin Hitchins, who has a penchant for killing small animals and seems to be harassing her other patients.

The typewriter drama gets so out of control that Paul actually begins to question whether something supernatural is involved, especially after notes began appearing in the typewriter—notes that he doesn’t remember typing. Everyone around him assumes he’s typing the notes and not remembering it, but Anna isn’t so sure. It’s not that she thinks there’s any ghostly activity going on, but she’s increasingly suspicious that something other than Paul’s head injury is in play.

Barclay imbues his propulsive narrative with a simmering, low menace, and readers won’t help but feel for poor Paul as he falls down the rabbit hole. Is he actually going crazy, or is something else going on? It would be hard to say much more without spoiling the denouement, but I will say that Barclay takes a risk in the last act that lesser authors may not have been able to pull off. This one is a lot of fun, and you’ll want to keep an eye out for the unlikely hero that rises to the occasion in the finale.

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A Noise Downstairs

• By Linwood Barclay
• William Morrow
• Reviewed by Dana King
• July 13, 2019

Enjoy this thriller’s hard-to-guess plot twists, but don’t look too hard behind the genre curtain.

Thrillers are a special breed of book. There are conventions readers insist on, and there are “conventions” readers are often willing to overlook. Linwood Barclay’s A Noise Downstairs has both.

Paul Davis is driving home, minding his own business, when he sees what looks like a friend’s car with a broken taillight. Kenneth Hoffman’s driving is erratic, and Paul wonders if his friend is either drunk or falling asleep. Either way, Paul decides to follow slowly behind long enough to see Kenneth park and throw something heavy into a dumpster.

Now Paul’s really curious. He continues to follow the car until Kenneth pulls over next to a wooded area. Paul noses in behind and is about to ask his friend what’s up when he notices what’s in the back of Kenneth’s station wagon.

That’s about the time Kenneth tries to beat Paul to death with a shovel. Paul survives but has PTSD issues for which he sees a therapist, Anna White, who cares for her patients while dealing with problems of her own, not the least of which is a father who is slowly slipping into dementia.

You can probably guess what’s in the back of Kenneth’s car. Maybe not with precision, but close enough. Much of the challenge in reviewing a well-constructed thriller like A Noise Downstairs is providing the reader some idea of what’s going on without giving away any plot twists, and everything is a potential plot twist. Suffice it to say that Barclay has done his homework. Every twist is well prepared, and the primary red herring works well. (I was sure I had things figured out halfway through. Not even close.)

The story unfolds at a leisurely pace until the natural momentum starts to accelerate events, after which the reveals come one after another, each building on what came before. Paul decides the only way he’ll get past his PTSD is to look closer into what happened that night, even going so far as to visit Kenneth in prison.

His therapist, Anna, gives her tepid approval, only to wonder about Paul’s deeper mental state when he starts to hear the typewriter his wife bought him at a yard sale writing notes all by itself in the middle of the night.

Barclay treads the line between Hitchcock and the supernatural deftly. You know something isn’t right, but are never quite sure what, or why. Is this a haunting story, a mental illness story, or is someone just messing with Paul? He’s a character one can empathize with, and Barclay’s sketch of him is such that all three options are possible, depending on your natural inclinations and where you are in the book.

The tying off of all the threads at the end is well done, yet not so neat as to seem contrived. Barclay is expert at keeping his chess pieces in motion throughout so readers can accept the premise of an action with no extraordinary suspensions of disbelief. Thriller fans will find everything they look for and then some.

Among the premises that must be accepted are some genre “conventions” mentioned above — that is, plot points which give rise to unlikely scenarios. For instance, half the characters in A Noise Downstairs are complete sociopaths. Citing examples would reveal too much, but there are some cold, dark people in this book who spent their entire lives waiting for the opportunity to give their dark sides free rein. In other words, not a light touch.

Another thriller convention some may find jarring: Confronted with a choice, characters invariably choose the course of most resistance, thus advancing the plot regardless of how little sense the decision makes.

For instance, Anna sees something suspicious and considers going to the police. Instead, she decides to visit the person who aroused her suspicions to see if she can trip him up. Much like Paul, who notices Kenneth’s son driving an ice-cream truck and can’t leave the young man alone. The result is the literary equivalent of the young girl in a see-through nightie who heads to the basement with a candle to see what’s making that creepy noise. “ Don’t go down there! ” we yell at the movie screen.  

Those may be quibbles or they may be deal-breakers; decide for yourself. The end result is a story that picks up speed as it careens toward an ending that Barclay nails. Summer is here. If you’re looking for a beach read that will pass the time in an entertaining manner, this may be just the book for you.

[Editor's note: This review originally ran in 2018.]

Dana King has twice been nominated for Shamus awards by the Private Eye Writers of America, for A Small Sacrifice and The Man in the Window . He also writes the Penns River series of police procedurals. His most recent book is Bad Samaritan .

Support the Independent by purchasing this title via our affliate links: Amazon.com Or through Bookshop.org

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A noise downstairs by linwood barclay.

Reviewed by Jim Napier

A chance encounter between two friends sets off a trail of intrigue ending in violence, in the fourteenth suspense tale by acclaimed Canadian thriller writer Linwood Barclay.

Paul Davis and Kenneth Hoffman both teach at West Haven College. It’s nearly midnight, and Davis is driving home when he notices his friend Hoffman in his car. He’s weaving, and one taillight on his Volvo is broken. Davis knows that his friend is compulsive about such things; it is uncharacteristic of the man that he wouldn’t have had it fixed, and intrigued, Davis follows him. When Hoffman pulls to the side of the road Davis decides to identify himself. Hoffman confronts him angrily, and as he approaches Hoffman’s car he discovers that it contains the lifeless bodies of two women.

In a desperate bid to conceal his crimes, Hoffman attacks Davis with a shovel, and his life is spared only when a policeman pulls up to check out the car with the broken taillight.

Eight months later Kenneth Hoffman is in prison, but Paul Davis is still suffering the aftermath of that evening: he’s on leave from his teaching duties, and suffering from headaches, nightmares, memory lapses and flashbacks to that terrible night. His therapist, Anna White, is helping Paul as he struggles to understand the man whom he’d called a friend and mentor and who had tried to murder him. When he reaches home after one of his sessions with Anna, Paul decides that the only way he will get some relief is to better understand his assailant. He sits down at his computer and begins an internet search on his assailant, unaware that someone is watching his house.

Meanwhile, Paul’s therapist is not without her own issues. Her father is suffering from dementia, and she is left to care for him alone. And another client, Gavin Hitchins, is proving to be a serious challenge. He’d locked an elderly neighbour’s cat in her attic, causing her serious distress. And on another occasion he’d phoned the father of a soldier who’d recently died in Iraq, claiming to be the son, alive, and telling him how much he hated him. Gavin hadn’t even known the man.

Anna is counselling Gavin as a result of a court order that keeps him out of jail. He’d had a troubled life, his father denigrating Gavin and his achievements, and his mother committing suicide when he was nineteen. But when his father developed liver cancer a few years later Gavin had taken advantage of his condition to exact some revenge, tormenting the man by hiding his medications and moving or adjusting household objects to frustrate him. Anna is convinced Gavin is a sociopath, entirely lacking empathy for everyone around him and a danger to those around him, and it seems the therapist is concerned for everyone around her except herself. Surrounded by damaged people, can anyone survive intact?

A Noise Downstairs is a chilling portrayal of the damaged people who walk among us, often impossible to detect. Barclay gives us a tale worthy of Alfred Hitchcock, a thriller for today’s far-from-perfect world. Don’t read it alone.

A Noise Downstairs is published by Doubleday Canada.

Jim Napier is a professional crime-fiction reviewer based in Canada. Since 2005 his book reviews and author interviews have been featured in several Canadian newspapers and on multiple websites. His crime novel Legacy was published in April of 2017, and the next in the series, Ridley’s War , is scheduled for release in the Spring of 2019. He can be reached at [email protected]

Sarah Collins Bookworm

Journalist, traveller, collector of hats, bookworm

Book Review: A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay.

I’ didn’t like it.

In a nutshell that’s my review.

I guess I’d better give you a review that is more than four words long.

A Noise Downstairs  is perhaps one of the most irritatingly frustrating books I’ve read in a long time…..

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s “normal” existence is turned upside down. 

After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, desperate to cheer him up, brings home a vintage typewriter; complete with ink ribbons and heavy round keys; to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write.

However, the typewriter itself is a problem. Paul swears it’s possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails.

Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. The killer had made his victims type apologies to him before ending their lives. Has another sick twist of fate entwined his life with the killer; could this be the same machine? Increasingly tormented but determined to discover the truth and confront his nightmare, Paul begins investigating the deaths himself.

A Noise Downstairs  somehow found its way on to my Kindle years ago and I never gave it a second thought.

On a whim, I stuck it on my  Beat the Backlist Challenge  at the start of the year. Even then, I wasn’t sure that this was going to be the book for me because let’s be honest, a plot that may involve a possessed typewriter is borderline stupid.

Anyway, in the mood for a psychological thriller, and wanting to make good on that particular reading challenge, I decided to give  A Noise Downstairs  a go. I wish I hadn’t.

Three bloody weeks it’s taken me to finish it. 

Yes, I know I should learn to give up and DNF a book I’m not enjoying (I really did come close) but here we are, irritatingly frustrated.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

Main character Paul is almost killed by a colleague who’s trying to hide a couple of bodies, as you do.

Months later in therapy and struggling with PTSD, Paul decides to confront what happened to him by writing about and visiting Kenneth Hoffman – his one-time friend turned attacker.

Paul’s wife, Charlotte, is actively encouraging him to do this and buys him a typewriter to get his creative juices flowing.

Paul’s therapist, Anna White, isn’t so sure the whole enterprise is a good idea. I mean he’s already traumatise.

When Paul starts to hear the typewriter chit chitting away all by itself at night, he becomes convinced that it’s possessed….

In fairness to our main character, there is a reason why he jumps to that conclusion. Basically, when Kenneth committed his murders, he made his victims write apologies on an old typewriter. The police never recovered the typewriter, so obviously Paul thinks he’s ended up with it and that Kenneth’s victims are trying to communicate with him through it. 

Of course,  THAT’S  the only logical explanation… All I can say is that I’m glad he’s not my professor.

With my eyes already rolling, I  then spent 60% of this book reading about Paul’s desperate attempts to prove that his typewriter was possessed and had belonged to Kenneth and my God, was it boring.

Reader, it was so boring, and (this is where my frustration comes in) IT DIDN’T NEED TO BE.

Barclay threw in some interesting sub plots. For instance, Anna was also treating a patient who had a history of terrorising people for no apparent reason; Barclay had  really shoehorned him and his behaviour into the plot and then abandoned him completely. Sure, it would have been far too easy for him to have been behind Paul’s terror but Christ, here’s a complex character that’s been wasted – FRUSTRTAING.

I didn’t see the point in the implied, potential romance between Anna and Paul. As soon as it appeared I thought  “of course, here we bloody go”,  it was unnecessary considering what came a short time later.

I had my suspicions about what was going on, and they were confirmed because, they were bloody obvious…

• Kenneth hadn’t killed the two women; he was covering for someone.
• Of course it was Charlotte tormenting her husband.

I shouldn’t then, have been surprised that it took Dr Anna White all of 20 minutes to figure out what Charlotte was up to – there’s no subtlety here. However, she was all of a sudden on to Charlotte after overhearing two whispered words, that’s all it took. She’s clearly wasted as a therapist, get the woman a police job.

I know what you’re thinking, you’re thinking there must have been something good about this book or else why would I keep reading?

Well, there was a plot twist that I didn’t see coming at all.

I was so stunned by it that I kind of wanted to see where it was going to take me, or if another twist was on the way. It did make the ending slightly more intriguing, it’s just a shame that I’d been bored to tears up until that point.

I will say this though, I may not have liked  A Noise Downstairs  but at least it stood out!

52 Books Blog

2024 reading challenge , 52 books , A Noise Downstairs , adult fiction , Beat the backlist 2024 , book reviews , books , contemporary fiction , Linwood Barclay , Psychological thriller , reviews , Thriller

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Journalist, writer, traveller, music lover, collector of hats, news addict, bookworm

6 thoughts on “ Book Review: A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay. ” Leave a comment ›

This book was on my to read list, I’m not feeling it anymore.

Like Liked by 1 person

Sorry 🙈 I do appear to be in the minority on this one though.

Don’t feel bad. Based on what you have written I would have closed the book and found another. I only give book 50 pages to pull me in.

This is something I need to adopt!

Not really hard, there are simply too many books I want to read to waste time on a book that is a struggle.

Well that’s disappointing! I normally enjoy Barclay’s books. Too bad that his one was such a struggle to read.

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A Noise Downstairs: A Novel Paperback – Large Print, July 24, 2018

The New York Times bestselling author of No Time for Goodbye returns with a haunting psychological thriller that blends the twists and turns of Gillian Flynn with the driving suspense of Harlan Coben, in which a man is troubled by odd sounds for which there is no rational explanation.

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s "normal" existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, desperate to cheer him up, brings home a vintage typewriter—complete with ink ribbons and heavy round keys—to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write.

However, the typewriter itself is a problem. Paul swears it’s possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails.

Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. The killer had made his victims type apologies to him before ending their lives. Has another sick twist of fate entwined his life with the killer—could this be the same machine? Increasingly tormented but determined to discover the truth and confront his nightmare, Paul begins investigating the deaths himself.

But that may not be the best thing to do. Maybe Paul should just take the typewriter back to where his wife found it. Maybe he should stop asking questions and simply walk away while he can. . . .

• Print length 528 pages
• Language English
• Publisher William Morrow Large Print
• Publication date July 24, 2018
• Dimensions 6 x 1.06 x 9 inches
• ISBN-10 0062845640
• ISBN-13 978-0062845641
• See all details

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Editorial Reviews

“Linwood Barclay’s novels – as intelligent as Michael Connelly’s, as compelling as Harlan Coben’s – never fail to astonish. A Noise Downstairs , his best work yet, is a cobra of a story: smooth, slippery, unnerving . . . and likely to strike when you least expect it. I devoured this book.” — A. J. Finn, #1  New York Times  bestselling author of The Woman in the Window 

“Vintage Barclay – A Noise Downstairs is an utterly compelling read with a twist you won’t see coming. I loved it!” — Shari Lapena, New York Times bestselling author of A Stranger in the House and The Couple Next Door

“[Barclay] does a masterful job of layering on the mysteries until we’re almost frantically turning the pages, impatient to find out what the hell is going on. A beautifully executed thriller.” — Booklist (starred review)

“Prepare to be blindsided by an ending you didn’t see coming. Barclay’s nerve-wracking tale will have readers scared to close their eyes at night.” — Library Journal

“A terrific edge-of-your-seat Hitchcockian psychological thriller that lives up to all the hype.” — New York Journal of Books

“Artfully crafted.” — New York Times Book Review

“Barclay is a master of manipulation. . . . Predictable becomes unpredictable in this compelling book that echoes the best of Harlan Coben.” — Associated Press

“[A] fast-paced psychological thriller . . . Barclay carefully conceals hidden motives and secret lives until the startling conclusion. Harlan Coben fans will find much to like.” — Publishers Weekly

“Creepy and compelling. . . . Barclay expertly weaves together the various plot strands to reach a wholly unexpected conclusion.” — The Guardian

“[A] twisty psychological tale . . . a satisfying and clever novel. The large cast and the story’s many moving parts perfectly set the reader up for the final climactic twist.” — Mystery Scene

“Predictable becomes unpredictable in this compelling book that echoes the best of Harlan Coben.” — Lisa Ko, author of The Leavers

Praise for No Time for Goodbye : “A deliciously smart thriller, full of surprises and perfect pacing. I’m jealous I didn’t write it.” — Alafair Burke

“A high-speed emotional roller-coaster. The surprises will leave you breathless.” — Robert Crais

“ No Time for Goodbye  just flies off the page. It’s a one-sit thriller. You sit down with this book and you won’t get up until you’ve turned the last page.” — Michael Connelly

“One of the best thrillers of the year! Utterly riveting.” — Tess Gerritsen

“A terrific page-turner that keeps you in suspense until the very end. If you like Harlan Coben, you’ll love Linwood Barclay.” — Peter Robinson

“Full of twists and turns.” — Parade , “Books We Love”

From the Back Cover

College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. But that normal existence is turned upside down late one evening when he catches a colleague trying to dispose of two dead bodies.

After nearly losing his own life that night, Paul is battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work and home. To cheer him up, his wife Charlotte gives him a surprise present, a vintage typewriter.

However, the typewriter soon becomes a source of anxiety itself. Paul swears he can hear the keys clacking in the early hours of the morning, but Charlotte and his son deny hearing any strange sounds. Are Paul’s claims real—or is he going off the rails as Charlotte fears?

Paul believes that the typewriter is somehow connected to the dark events he witnessed eight months ago. But maybe he should stop asking questions and simply walk away while he can. Because if he doesn’t, his darkest terrors just might come true.

About the Author

Linwood Barclay is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous previous novels and two thrillers for children. His books have been translated into more than two dozen languages. He wrote the screenplay adaptation for his novel Never Saw it Coming and his book The Accident has been made into a TV series in France. His novel No Time for Goodbye was a global bestseller. A native of Connecticut, he now lives in Toronto with his wife, Neetha.

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ William Morrow Large Print; Large type / Large print edition (July 24, 2018)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 528 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0062845640
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0062845641
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.25 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1.06 x 9 inches
• #39,881 in Psychological Thrillers (Books)
• #44,661 in Murder Thrillers
• #117,250 in Suspense Thrillers

About the author

Linwood barclay.

Linwood Barclay is a former columnist for The Toronto Star and the author of several critically acclaimed novels, including Too Close to Home and No Time for Goodbye, a #1 Sunday Times (UK) bestseller. He lives near Toronto with his wife.

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Customers find the plot engrossing, twisty, and easy to follow. They also say the perspectives keep it easy to understand the sequence of events and that it grabs their attention from page one. Customers also mention that the story progresses with a linear pacing and that the book has a few surprises.

"...And there are so many twisty turns in this story that I think any person who enjoys reading psychological chillers will find this one delicious!..." Read more

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Book Review: ‘A Noise Downstairs: A Novel’ By Linwood Barclay’

by RedCarpetCrash | Jul 17, 2018 | Books | 0 comments

Paul Davis is a college professor who is married for second time and shares custody of his son and lives a normal life on Long Island Sound in Connecticut. One night Paul sees one of his colleagues Kenneth Hoffman driving erratically on a deserted road and follows him. Big mistake on his part. He sees him dump something in an isolated dumpster. Then follows him and sees he stops near the woods. He gets out and asks him if everything is okay. He is trying to get rid of two dead female bodies. He also gets a shovel across his head. Luckily a cop had seen Kenneth’s car with a light out and came upon the scene.

Months later Paul is still suffering from that blow. He has memory lapses and PTSD and depression. He’s seeing a shrink Anna to try and work out his issues. His marriage is also been suffering. His wife is a real estate agent and is often gone a lot. Paul thinks he might want to write a book about what happened to him and also go see Kenneth in jail to try and get closure.

Paul’s wife Charlotte one day brings him home an old typewriter to encourage him to write. Soon Paul thinks he is losing his mind. In the middle of the night he starts hearing the typewriter typing away. He thinks someone is breaking into the house. But there’s no evidence and Charlotte isn’t hearing it. And then mysterious typed pages appear with wording from the two women that Kenneth killed. They think this might be the typewriter involved with Kenneth’s case that was never recovered.

Paul soon thinks he is going crazier than he already thought he was. He digs and digs but is having no luck figuring it out. And then tragedy strikes and we learn what has been going on with Paul and possessed typewriter.

A page-turner of a story with twists and turns you don’t see coming right up to the very end! My first time reading one of author Linwood Barcly’s novel (and he has 17 of them) and I look forward to reading the next one.

You can pick up A Noise Downstairs: A Novel in stores on Tuesday, July 24, from William Morrow.

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