Maite R. Ochotorena
Where fear dwells
Supernatural drama
Synopsis
A thriller that grips you with raw emotion, a story of fear and courage, of pain and hope.
When Ainhoa Lasa leaves San Sebastián to escape her husband, she is a broken woman. Desperate, she seeks refuge in an old mountain hut belonging to her family, as abandoned and ruined as her spirit. However, the specter of the abuse Urko has subjected her to for so many years doesn't disappear; instead, it dwells within her, deeply ingrained in her very being. As she tries to overcome this ordeal, the solitude of the mountains begins to feel oppressive when, in addition, a wave of robberies in the valley threatens her peace. Very soon, that loneliness, the isolation, and the fear she still carries inside will transform her escape into a terrifying nightmare.
Where Fear Dwells is a journey into the psyche of a tormented woman, a journey through the darkness. The author masterfully delves into the deepest subconscious and forces us to dive into unknown depths, where reason and reality transcend all limits.
Thoughts on abuse that inspired this book
"Because I can't bear not having dared; I can't bear knowing that I could have chosen and I didn't, that I could have looked myself straight in the eye, without pretense, but that I preferred to tiptoe past, lest I be overwhelmed.
Because, sometimes, swimming against the current is easier than defending what's ours, and standing up for ourselves doesn't appeal to us, so we abandon ourselves to the sidelines, without looking back. We leave a shadow that will later cover everything, clothe us in anonymity.
Because pointing the finger at another, less uncertain, destiny seems the most logical thing to do, and I got up and left the room early without looking back.
Because becoming like others and detaching myself from my own ideas, because putting the brakes on my imperfections and denying my mistakes, and even more so my virtues, time and time again, has apparently been a goal. For what? To avoid being? To avoid feeling? To avoid taking risks?" What a shame not knowing how to say who you are, what a shame to leave behind your own footprints, your genuine ones, to put on other shoes, without knowing how to walk in them.
Thank goodness that life and time confront you with your abandonment, and you have no choice but to look back at yourself and explain why, or why not. Thank goodness that courage is measured by a single, more or less fortuitous, instant that decides everything.
Everything I wasn't remains in the past. Everything I am stems from it. And what I will be mocks my cowardice and laughs, because, in the end, it always wins.
"The night and that intruder who watches me with the eyes of a hyena. The shadows and that predator that stands between my frozen body and sleep, refusing to visit me. The darkness pregnant with silences that torture my memory in an endless punishment, their poisonous voices ruminating on my fate.
The night, and that perverse intuition suspended in a shriek, stifled by the very fear that clings to my throat and climbs up until it clouds my senses. The darkness, reveling in the shadow that takes refuge in the night; the darkness, that veil that clothes me in anguish and snakes across my skin, bristling my fear, sharp and cold.
The night, that realm of doubts, of phantoms, plagued by confusion, the hell of the repentant who closes his eyes to punishment. The shadows, lingering from the abyss that opens between my dominated mind and the possibility of a dawn and the banishment of its henchmen." The darkness, which prides itself on its dominion and extends beyond my consciousness, falls like a blanket of icy dew upon the world.
There is no night like this, so cold and lonely, when I yearn for light, for understanding, when I neither sleep nor wake, and my sleeplessness is troubled by deception, lying prey to nocturnal reverie.
At times, the night and its shadows rule my senses.
"He's coming, laden with reprisals, the torturer is coming, the skeletal behemoth of compassion, the harbinger of punishment, he's coming.
I hear him treading on the other side of my shadows, I hear him breathing in my thoughts, he seeps into my dreams and twists them. I hear him, I fear him. He whispers his poison to me, he's killing me, little by little, relentlessly, he doesn't let go.
His eyes pierce me, they are two burning embers of fervor, fervor to amalgamate my thoughts, to tame my beliefs, to dominate what I have been and what I will be, to crush my present so that I may never breathe freely again."
"I hear him treading on the other side of my shadows, I hear him breathing in my thoughts, he hears me breathing in my thoughts, he hears me breathing in my thoughts, he hears me breathing in my dreams, he hears me breathing in my dreams." He is coming, blinded by hatred; he is the dark beast that devours all, the absence of light, the bottomless pit of greed, of capricious whims, of despotic ego, and his appetite is endless. He never tires of overwhelming and twisting, hiding behind false smiles, in the shadow of appearances, in the game of masks of his existence, which mocks and revels in the illusions of others, a tyrannical thief of souls, he dresses in the stolen and rigged hopes of fraud; he sneaks in, he slithers, he is coming, the predator… the one you must fear because you will never see him coming, and if you ever do, he will already be upon you, devouring you.
Lo que dicen los lectores...
Gorka
«Es increíble cómo esta escritora te introduce en el libro, en los paisajes, en los miedos, pesadillas, como si estuiésemos allí mismo.»
Olivia
«Este libro te engancha desde la primera página y consigue que empatices con la protagonista inmediatamente.»
Patricia Alcantud
«Es el primer libro que leo de este estilo y la verdad es que me ha sorprendido. No lo empecé con muchas ganas y, sin embargo, me enganchó desde el primer capítulo.»