THE SECRETARY

Having served her powerful employer at the expense of all else,
a devoted secretary finds herself a pawn in her boss’s ruthless game—a betrayal
that comes with consequences.

Reliable and conscientious to a fault, Christine Butcher is
hired as secretary and personal assistant to Mina Appleton just as Mina is
coming into power, having gently ousted her aging father from the family
business. And so it is that Christine finds herself the right-hand woman to the
new chair of Appleton’s Supermarkets, a chain that was once “synonymous with
fair trade and good practice”—principles that don’t much interest Mina. Petite
and polished—a media darling who charms the country on national TV—Mina demands
total allegiance, and Christine, a workhorse who prides herself on absolute discretion,
is only too happy to oblige. Catering to Mina becomes not just her duty, but
her obsession; Christine serves Mina first and always, at the expense of her
own family. “We flourished together, Mina and I,” explains Christine. “She,
undoubtedly, the dominant species. I, like a woodland plant, able to blossom in
her shade. I was good groundcover, you might say.” When Mina’s business
practices become the subject of a legal investigation, Christine is there—good
groundcover—assisting her, making moves that will reroute the course of her own
life. “I made some questionable choices,” she reflects ominously in the novel’s
opening pages. “Choices I suspect many would have made in my position.” But the power dynamic will shift: Christine,
the silent, watchful, secretary, will not allow Mina’s betrayal to go
unpunished—no matter the personal cost. Mina and Christine—neither quite
fleshed out—seem to exist only in relation to one another; this is not a book
about character but about mutual destruction. This gives the novel a somewhat
flimsy quality, but what it lacks in substance it makes up for with style.
Knight lays it on thick, foreshadowing the violence to come early and often,
giving the book an over-the-top gothic quality; not subtle but an awful lot of
fun.

A cinematic page-turner steeped in atmosphere and just awaiting
its adaptation to miniseries.