Brutes is the debut novel by Dizz Tate, detailing the disappearance of a pastor’s daughter and a clique of Floridian teenage girls and their view of the world. The claustrophobic narrative is ambitious for a first novel, with different characters appearing at intervals to add to the overall structure of the story. The girls themselves are not very nice – hence the book’s title – but there is fun to be had in seeing the whole thing unfold. Beneath the dreamlike prose there exists a dark undercurrent of foreboding and a rather sinister plot. The steamy, alligator-infested lakes lie in stark contrast to the family-friendly facade of Walt Disney World, and the novel nicely evokes a sense of unsettling disquiet. This is a coming of age novel, but it’s nothing overtly original, coming so soon after Emma Cline’s The Girls, The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides and Suzanne Berne’s A Crime in the Neighbourhood, which trod similar paths.

Having said that, it’s certainly well written, although one does feel that Tate will go on to better things. The chapters jump forward and back in time, and this isn’t always obvious, so it’s a challenging read at times. It’s not a book that I could recommend however.