Catherine Fernandez (Noor Khan)

If you lived in or near Toronto in the late 1980s and early 1990s, you probably have some recollection of the Scarborough Rapist’s reign of terror. If you are a woman, its impact is likely tattooed on your psyche, whether you’re aware of it or not. In her fourth novel, Catherine Hernandez returns to her familiar Scarborough setting to explore the long-lasting effects of coming of age in the shadow of this fear.

Alma is a fortysomething film editor working on a true-crime series. When the latest episode turns out to be about the infamous Scarborough Stalker (a thinly fictionalized version of real-life rapist and murderer Paul Bernardo), Alma finds herself triggered by the footage and images she’s exposed to, revealing deep trauma from her early teen years when the Stalker terrorized her neighbourhood.

Through flashbacks, we learn violence was a part of Alma’s life long before fear of the Scarborough Stalker entered the picture. Her mother, Luz, is an unpredictable and volatile woman who is quick with a fist, particularly if she feels she has been embarrassed by Alma or Alma’s older sister. In response, Alma learns to twist herself into whatever shape will be safest, whether that’s a quiet, dutiful daughter to Luz or a pliant girlfriend to a boy named Toby, who accuses her of being gay (which she is, though she’s not ready to embrace that yet) when she doesn’t want to have sex with him. In both cases, her attempts at self-preservation fail.

The physical, emotional, psychological, and sexual abuse she suffers in her youth prompt Alma to carry a tendency toward self-recrimination into adulthood; it’s always her fault, even if she has no idea what “it” is.

This concept of laying blame at the feet of the victim is central to the book’s narrative. While Hernandez craftily demonstrates through Luz that abuse comes in many forms and that women are more than capable of inflicting it, she saves her most powerful commentary for gendered violence. Hernandez is not a subtle writer, and her forthright depictions of the ways society puts the onus on women and girls to prevent themselves from being abused, attacked, raped, and murdered, rather than on men not to perpetuate these crimes, are note perfect. From self-defence classes to rape whistles to comments disguised as well-meaning advice of the “better watch out, a pretty girl like you” variety, the author nails every frustrating instance of misplaced burden.

A prefatory note states that the book is a work of fiction based on real events, concluding “It’s not about him, it’s about us,” and indeed the Stalker is little more than a symbolic through line in Behind You. Hernandez creates a tenuous connection between Alma and one of the Stalker’s victims, but this feels superfluous. The mere fact of his existence and that of others like him is enough. Alma’s story, informed by her culture, sexuality, appearance, and everything else that makes her unique, is also a universal one of fear and frustration that will resonate with every reader who’s ever had to look back over their shoulder, just in case.