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Myerson’s horror of home truths

The Stopped Heart
by Julie Myerson
(Jonathan Cape, £12.99)

THIS is anything but an enjoyable book. Yet it is technically highly accomplished and its compelling and brutal psychological honesty make it arguably Julie Myerson’s greatest literary achievement to date.

The Stopped Heart draws together two of the predominant themes in the author’s previous output — the often unspoken linkages between people who have inhabited the same house throughout the generations and the impact of bloody violence on otherwise safe and mundane lives.

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