The Shadows: A Novel

The Shadows (2020) is a psychological thriller by Alex North, the pseudonym for established British crime writer Steve Mosby. It is North’s second novel, following his internationally best-selling debut, The Whisper Man. The novel follows Paul Adams, who returns to his hometown after 25 years and must confront a horrific murder from his past when a new, eerily similar killing occurs nearby. The narrative explores themes such as The Inescapable Haunting of Past Traumas, The Dangerous Seduction of Escaping Reality, and The Moral Ambiguity of Parental Protection.

This guide is based on the 2022 Celadon Books mass market edition.

Content Warning: The source text and this guide feature depictions of cursing, graphic violence, animal death, child death, death by suicide, bullying, child abuse, emotional abuse, illness, and death.

Plot Summary

Paul Adams returns to his hometown of Gritten for the first time in 25 years to be with his dying mother, Daphne. Six months ago, she was diagnosed with cancer, and unbeknownst to Paul, she was diagnosed with dementia several years ago. Upon his arrival, his mother gives him cryptic warnings, insisting there is something “in the house” and speaking of “red hands everywhere” (25). Her words bring up the traumatic event that drove Paul away from Gritten: a brutal murder committed by his teenage friends, Charlie Crabtree and Billy Roberts. Paul is haunted by his memories of the events and his own role in them.

In the nearby town of Featherbank, Detective Amanda Beck, still grieving the recent death of her father, a former police officer, investigates a new murder. A teenage boy, Michael Price, has been killed in a quarry. His body is posed ritualistically, surrounded by hundreds of bloody handprints. Two local teenagers, Elliot Hick and Robbie Foster, are quickly arrested, covered in blood and in possession of knives and “dream diaries,” journals used to record and influence dreams, a key element of the original Gritten murder.

The narrative shifts between two timelines: the present day and Paul’s youth over 25 years earlier. In the past timeline, a teenage Paul and his best friend, James Dawson, are bullied at their new school. Two outsiders, the charismatic and manipulative Charlie Crabtree and his follower Billy Roberts, defend them. After Charlie eerily seems to predict a bully’s accidental death, the four boys form an uneasy friendship.

Charlie introduces the group to lucid dreaming, encouraging them to keep dream diaries and attempt to contact a sinister entity he calls “Red Hands,” whom he claims haunts the local woods, known as the Shadows. While Paul remains skeptical, James becomes captivated by Charlie’s ideas. The infatuation escalates, with Charlie claiming to share dreams with James and suggesting they can use their collective dream power to kill their abusive teacher. He also says that a murder, completed according to Red Hands’ directions, will ensure their escape from reality and entrance into a dream world. Paul, increasingly disturbed by Charlie’s influence and the group’s actions, including the supposed killing of the teacher’s dog in a dream, eventually breaks away from them.

In the present, Amanda’s investigation reveals that the Featherbank killers were members of an online true-crime forum fixated on the original Gritten murder. They were goaded into a copycat crime by a user named CC666, who claims to have been present at the original murder and allegedly proves their identity by sharing a photograph of Charlie’s dream diary, which has been missing since he disappeared.

Amanda learns that 25 years ago, Charlie and Billy murdered their classmate. Billy was arrested after wandering out of the woods and confessing, but Charlie was never seen again. Amanda’s investigation leads her to Gritten, where she discovers that the recently paroled Billy Roberts has been tortured and murdered. The trail of the mysterious CC666 user points to James Dawson. Soon after, James and his mother, Eileen, are found murdered in their new home, and James’s stepfather, Carl Dawson, is missing.

Meanwhile, Paul’s return to Gritten is marked by escalating threats. He reconnects with Marie, the owner of a local bookshop where he worked as a teen. He finds bloody fist prints on his mother’s door, sees a figure in the woods resembling the description of Red Hands, and receives one of Charlie’s handmade dolls from 25 years ago, meant to aid their lucid dreaming, through the mail slot.

Searching his mother’s attic, he discovers boxes of newspaper clippings about the original murder. His search leads to a more shocking discovery: clippings revealing that two other copycat murders, inspired by Charlie’s crime, have occurred over the years, deaths he never knew about. Marie reveals a local legend suggesting that Charlie and James were half-brothers, their shared biological father having died by suicide in the Shadows years before.

After his mother dies, Paul returns to her house and makes a startling discovery: Charlie’s original dream diary is hidden among his own old notebooks in his childhood bedroom. Reading it, he realizes Charlie faked the shared dream experiment by preparing multiple, nearly identical entries in advance. Carl Dawson then appears and confesses the truth of what happened 25 years ago. The novel reveals that Jenny, not Paul, was murdered by Charlie and Billy. After the murder, Charlie went to the Dawsons’ house and attacked Eileen. James, in a fit of rage, killed Charlie in self-defense.

To protect his stepson, Carl helped Eileen hide Charlie’s body in their attic, where it remained for years. Years later, Carl confessed the truth to Daphne, who had been his friend for years. He asked her to keep the secret, which she did, but was tormented by guilt over the copycat killings that followed. Shortly before her fatal fall, she stole Charlie’s diary from Carl, hiding it amongst Paul’s notebooks in his bedroom.

Carl tells Paul that he finally took Charlie’s bones out to the woods and scattered them to look as though he had died there, years ago. As Carl finishes his confession, the police arrive and arrest him as the prime suspect in the recent murders of Bill, James, and Eileen. Paul, wanting to protect his mother’s memory, remains silent. The novel reveals that Paul’s meetings with adult Jenny in the present were actually his lucid dreams, which he still engages in.

Amanda puts the pieces together and realizes that the real killer is Dean Price, the father of the Featherbank victim, Michael. A former soldier consumed by grief, Dean has been hunting down and torturing those connected to the original case to uncover the truth about Charlie’s disappearance and stop future deaths. Realizing that Paul is in danger, Amanda leaves for Gritten immediately.

Dean comes to Paul’s house and attacks him, demanding to know what happened to Charlie. To save himself, Paul invents a story and leads Dean into the Shadows, pretending to take him to Charlie’s body. Paul manages to escape Dean, and Amanda arrives and calls out, creating a diversion that allows Paul to get to safety. Dean is later found in the woods, having died by suicide. Nearby, authorities discover Charlie Crabtree’s skeletal remains, finally closing the 25-year-old case. In the aftermath, Amanda finds a way to process her grief over her father’s death. Paul, having confronted his past, delivers a eulogy at his mother’s funeral and finds a measure of peace, contemplating a new future in Gritten.