It wouldn’t be a spoiler to say ‘Lullaby’ by Leila Slimani, a French-Moroccan journalist and novelist, is basically a murder story. The book cover gives that away and you will also find out on the very first page that the nanny kills the children. But what you will really be waiting for is the motive behind the murders and Slimani slowly builds the tension in the story while giving you a clue here and there. It all makes for a riveting read, one that will leave you with a chill in your bones.

 

 

The set-up is simple and straight­forward: Paul, a music producer, and Myriam, a lawyer, with two young children, look for a nanny so that Myriam can take up a job that her friend has offered her at his law firm. This is how Louise enters their life. With her prim Peter Pan collar, meticulously painted nails, an age­less face, and an apparent way with children, she is just the nanny they had in mind.

 

 

Actually, she is even better than what they had in mind. Louise is not only great with their two kids but keeps the house clean and even cooks dinner. It’s like Mary Poppins has come into their lives and solved all their problems. Lou­ise, thus, becomes indispensible for the family, so much so that Paul and Myriam even take her along during a family vacation.

 

 

But things quickly unravel and how! Louise’s façade starts crum­bling as she tells the children cruel tales, takes a simple game of hide-and-seek so seriously that the chil­dren get scared, and starts making herself at home at her employer’s house, sometimes even insisting she sleep over in the children’s bed­room. Paul and Myriam start feel­ing unsettled by her ways and, as a reader, you get spooked too. But the slow unspooling of Louise’s own family life—there’s a daughter who deserts her—makes you sympathize with her despite the horrifying act you know she is guilty of.

 

 

Lullaby will feel familiar and you will get a sense of déjà vu because the issues it deals with—class, race, gender and above all parenting—are ones we see, hear of, deal with, and read about ever so often. But what works for Lullaby is how bril­liantly Slimani has crafted the story. If at one point you are seeing things entirely from Louise’s perspectives, the very next page will have you firmly on the parents’ side.

 

 

Also, a translated work can be a so-so experience but Sam Taylor’s translation is so graceful and con­trolled that it gives nothing away of all the deranged unraveling to come even a second before it’s due. You will read Lullaby with a mounting sense of dread and, at just a little over 200 pages long, you will wish it were longer.