The magnificent Dungeon
House and gardens overlook Cumbria’s remote western coast with its mix
of beaches, dunes, and fells, Roman ruins, and nuclear plant. Twenty
years ago the wealthy Whiteleys called it home. But not a happy one.
Malcolm Whiteley had begun to disintegrate under financial and emotional
pressures. He suspected various men in their social circle of being his
wife’s lover. After a disastrous party for the neighbours, Lysette told
Malcolm their marriage was over. Sadly an old Winchester rifle he had
been hiding was at hand….
Fast forward to today. Hannah Scarlett’s cold case team is looking into the three-year-old disappearance of Lily Elstone whose father Gray had been Malcolm’s accountant. The investigation coincides with yet another disappearance of a teenage girl: Shona Whiteley, daughter of Malcolm’s nephew Nigel, who now lives in the Dungeon House despite its tragic history. As Hannah’s team digs down into the past, doubts arise about what really happened the night Malcolm killed his wife and 16-year-old daughter Amber, then himself.
Most of the people once close to the Whiteleys still live nearby. And one Joanna Footit, and her secrets, now returns from London. While Hannah leads the complex police inquiries, it is her lover, historian Daniel Kind, who supplies Hannah with the lead that unlocks the whole. Does it come too late?
If you're a Columbo fan, stop reading my review. This book is for you.
Now,
for the rest of you, this was the most surprising read of this summer.
I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review, and it was bound in
yellow. There was no front cover to reveal anything about the
contents. I never read the the blurb on the back of the book. I just
opened it and delved in. I was immediately spellbound.
The
writing is smooth and transitions throughout the book nicely, even
during time elapses. You forget that you're reading and just become
lost in the story.
The
characters are incredibly well-formed, which is surprising since there
are so many of them. This is a large group of people that we're getting
to know! Edwards has one of those rare talents of making you care
about a person in as little description as possible. From the moment
you meet them, you get a feel for them. You judge them, but you judge
them the way that they've been written. Though you could sit back and
form your own opinions of them, you won't want to until later in the
story. The beginning of the book is just sitting back and watching the
chaos.
There's
more mystery to this book than first meets the eye. It's intricately
designed so that just when you think you have something figured out, you
suddenly realize that you've only scratched the surface of what really
happened. The characters who you've prejudged in the beginning,
according to Edwards' writing, have to be judged all over again. No one
is what they seem. The more you read, the further you fall into a
world of deception and treachery.
If
you enjoy mysteries, this one is deep. It's easy to dive into and at
the end of it you have a sense of completion and resolution.
*I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Shawn
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The old grey donkey, Eeyore stood by himself in a thistly corner of the Forest, his front feet well apart, his head on one side, and thought about things. Sometimes he thought sadly to himself, "Why?" and sometimes he thought, "Wherefore?" and sometimes he thought, "Inasmuch as which?" and sometimes he didn't quite know what he was thinking about.
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