A Secret Rage by Charlaine Harris

A Secret Rage was published in 1984, well before Ms. Harris' Sookie Stackhouse novels.  However, my edition only has blurbs and quotes about the Sookie Stackhouse novels, and none for A Secret Rage.  In addition to the Sookie Stackhouse novels, I've read the Harper Connelly series and the Midnight, Texas series.


I really enjoy Ms. Harris' ability to reflect life in small towns in a way that rings true.  Her observations of human nature in a small town setting resonate with broader application, even as supernatural events are occurring around the characters.  I also find Ms. Harris' female characters fascinating.  They are indisputably strong, but in a way which is not very similar at all to the customary "strong female character" archetype, yet doesn't feel like Ms. Harris is just trying to subvert the tropes either.  Again, her characters feel like real people that Ms. Harris has observed, thought about and done an excellent job reflecting on the page in a manner that shows some different aspects of how women can be strong.


A Secret Rage is, as it turns out, largely non-supernatural.  It deals with a small college town which is in the midst of a series of attacks by a serial rapist.  It doesn't turn into a police procedural however, and unlike many similar novels, doesn't revel in the cleverness of the crime.  Instead it places all of its focus on those who suffer from the crime (one of which is the protagonist, and it doesn't seem right to call her a victim; she has much more agency than that).  It deals with the aftermath of the crime and the way other people deal with the survivor with a level of depth and empathy I don't often see in serial crime novels.


That's not to say it's a grueling examination of the consequences of rape.  It's a crime novel, tending toward the cozy style, but with a much more grotesque crime.  It just observes the consequences and effects of the crime much more than the usual token nod to atmosphere of a town in fear, and isn't afraid to look directly at those who suffered the crime and how it changes their lives.


The science is dated (understandably so, since it was presumably written in the early 80s or before) but it's still a satisfying suspense and mystery story.  And for those of us who yearned, all through the novel, for the protagonist to turn into some supernatural creature to take bloody vengeance on the evildoer... well there's just enough of a wink in that direction to satisfy me.