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The Raven's Book Bunker, Brighton and Hove (2025)

21/02/2025

MURDER AT THE MONASTERY BY REV RICHARD COLES

I love Richard Coles' Canon Clement books, and this I think is the best one so far! Poor, dear Daniel Clement, reeling from the fact that DS Neil Vanloo is not, after all, in love with him but with Honoria de Floures, has temporarily fled Champton and taken refuge in the monastery where he was once a novice -the Abbey of Ss Philip and James at Ravenspurn. There he hopes to come to terms with his disappointment and recover some spiritual and emotional equilibrium.
But of course it doesn't turn out to be quite the undisturbed retreat he was expecting - where there are monks, there's monkey business, and everyone at Ravenspurn seems to be hiding a secret, and it all ends in - yes, as the title suggests, another murder.
Meanwhile, Daniel's mother, the redoubtable Audrey Clement, is staying at the de Floures stately pile, Champton House, while repairs are carried out to the rectory (damaged by fire in Canon Clement #2). Everyone is wondering why Daniel has disappeared so suddenly, and everyone except poor Neil Vanloo suspects the truth. But is Neil and Honoria's affair the 'real thing' he thinks it is? And is Neil, perhaps, a little more adaptable than he's hitherto considered himself to be? Once he realises what Daniel feels for him, these questions arise ... and then, of course, there's a murder investigation to assist with, which means that Neil, also, ends up at Ravenspurn ...
It's all so wittily and charmingly written - lots of theological and ecclesiastical detail, which may be a tad confusing or boring for those not familiar with Churchy stuff, but plenty of in-jokes for those of us that are to chuckle over. I loved it! 😍

17/02/2025

Charming story with a good feminist message! Janet Pimm, in her seventies, living alone following both bereavement and disappointment in love, tends her allotment daily but has difficulty engaging with her neighbours and fellow gardeners.
Then a crisis occurs - the precious Seaview allotments are threatened with closure, due to the discovery of Japanese knotweed in the vicinity! Convinced that there's some foul play afoot, and that this is in fact a land grab by a company owned by one of the Councillors, Janet sets out to do a bit of investigating - but for this she needs help. Enter neighbour Bev, a friendly midwife in the throes of menopause, who's been trying to draw Janet out of her shell for months - and the two set out on an adventure that eventually kick-starts a whole movement for the voices of 'invisible women' everywhere - older women who are deemed to be of no account by big business, by Councils and ultimately, by the Government. The campaign to save Seaview Allotments takes on a life of its own, goes viral, is showcased on the local news, and transforms the lives of both Janet and Bev. A great read!

14/02/2025

Never having read Nancy Mitford's 'The Pursuit of Love', I'm unfamiliar with the original on which 'Darling' is based - but as a writer of pastiche myself, I'm a sucker for an alternative perspective on a well-known story, and this one transposes the Radlett family from the inter-War years to the 21st century, with hilarious and fascinating results. It works perfectly well as a stand-alone, you don't have to know the original incarnations of Fran, the narrator, and her bevy of cousins - Louisa, Linda, Jassie and Rob, whose parents, Uncle Matt and Aunt Sadie are a retired rockstar and an Indian diplomat's daughter respectively; not short of a bob or two, then, but determined to bring up their home-schooled, offline, semi-feral brood as far away from the public gaze as possible, on an isolated Norfolk farm.
The heroine of the story is second Radlett daughter Linda, Fran's confidante and contemporary, and her heart-breakingly innocent pursuit of Mr Right. Family wealth notwithstanding, Linda is unworldly, idealistic and easily led, and her entree into the real world, where she immediately gets snapped up as a model by designer Merlin Berners and briefly descends into a life of excess and hedonism, leads to a totally unsuitable marriage to a staid financier on the rebound. Her second marriage, to a self-obsessed, anarchic poet and novelist, a wannabe man-of-the-people who tries to hide his Eton education and wealthy origins, is no less disastrous; but some years later, in Paris, Linda finally does meet the love of her life.
The characters are wonderful - especially curmudgeonly, irascible Uncle Matthew, and Fran's step-uncle Davey Warbeck, a kind but fastidious interior designer with a delicate constitution. But Fran herself, her beloved Aunt Emily, and her own husband and two children remain disappointingly blank and featureless - something I assume is also the case in the Nancy Mitford original, along with the shock ending which left me quite horrified!
Still, 'Darling' had me riveted from the beginning, and gave me many chuckles along the way, mainly at the eccentricities and outbursts of wonderful old rocker Uncle Matthew - so it 4 stars out of 5 from me.

11/02/2025

Can't upload the cover of this one due to problems with my PC, but it's DEATH AT THE SIGN OF THE ROOK by Kate Atkinson!

This is Kate Atkinson's 6th 'Jackson Brodie' novel, but the first I've read - it works so well as a stand-alone that it took me a while to work out that it's part of a series, and I'll definitely be reading more!
Whilst ageing aristo The Dowager Lady Milton reluctantly prepares to help her sons host a Murder Mystery Weekend at the country house hotel to which the East Wing of Burton Makepeace House has been converted, Jackson Brodie is on the trail of a real criminal operating in the area - an accomplished art thief who masquerades as a domestic helper - carer, cleaner, or in the case of the Turner stolen from Burton Makepeace House some years ago, a thoroughly efficient housekeeper. The latest theft, from the nearby home of recently deceased Dorothy Padgett, has her carer as the main suspect and her twin adopted children up in arms - even though they insist that the small Renaissance portrait of a 'Woman with a Weasel' (or is a stoat? Or a pine marten?) has no provenance and only sentimental value.
As Brodie and his reluctant sidekick DI Regina 'Reggie' Chase set about the task of tracking down both thief and painting, we get to know some of the residents of the former Burton Makepeace estate - most notably the delightful vicar, Rev Simon Cate, widowed, sensitive and given to much metaphysical speculation, who lost his faith some time ago and now seems to have lost his voice as well - neither loss ideal in a clergyman; and traumatised Afghanistan veteran Major Ben Jennings, living with his sister and her partner in a former dairyman's cottage. Both will have a key role to play in the remarkable sequence of events that sees everyone converging on Burton Makepeace House, during a snow storm, where real guns, a real body and a real murder somewhat overshadow the hammy and hilarious acting of the Red Herrings troupe booked for the Murder Mystery Weekend.
The characters are all so credible, the writing very witty and frequently hilarious, and the plot a cracking good whodunnit - I absolutely loved it!

06/02/2025

Beautiful writing here, as always from Maggie O'Farrell, and a heart breaking story sensitively told. There are two timelines in The Hand That First Held Mine. The first, beginning in the 1950s, follows the story of Lexie Sinclair: her escape to London from the stifling confines of a disapproving family, her two major relationships with very different men, her slow path to career success as a journalist, her experience of motherhood with young son Theo, and her ultimate tragedy. The second, set in the present day, presents new mother Elina, a Finnish national living in Britain, her partner Ted and their struggles to come to terms with parenthood following the traumatic birth of their baby son Jonah. It's not until about three quarters of the way through the book that we realise the two stories are related, with Ted's parents and old family home as the key.
What I like about Maggie O'Farrell's writing is that she takes her time setting each scene, writing in the present tense and interweaving each character's mood/inner struggle/epiphany with its surroundings. Also her depiction of post-traumatic stress, as experienced both by Elina following her son's birth, and by Ted, inexplicably until we put two and two together, is absolutely spot-on, with memory gaps, neurological blips and flashbacks causing fear and confusion both for those experiencing them and for their loved ones - my husband has Complex PTSD, so I'm very critical in these matters, and O'Farrell has definitely done her research there.
A rare five stars from me - thoroughly recommended!

25/01/2025

A creepy page-turner, this, all set within my native South London patch - it had me hooked from the start! It follows three different timelines from the history of the same Victorian House on Peckham Rye (not strictly Rye Lane, as the author admits in the acknowledgements - I'm glad she does, it was niggling me!) In 2008, Maxine and Seb are struggling to renovate their new home, bought with Maxine's inheritance but still in disrepair following the loss of Seb's job in the wake of the Lehman financial collapse. The house, they learn from a neighbour, has been left derelict ever since the owner, Diana Lloyd, was murdered by her lodgers back in 1995, and Seb is sure that the place is haunted - taps turn themselves on and off, footsteps traipse to and fro in empty rooms, and the second floor in particular has a decided creepy feel.
The 1995 timeline follows the Delaney family, fallen on hard times and forced to take cramped lodgings on the top floor of the house while the landlady occupies all the rest of the space - except for the rooms on the second floor, which are 'out of bounds'. Lee and Ruth struggle to come to terms with the change in their circumstances that Lee's compulsive gambling has forced upon them, and worry about their thirteen year old son, Cookie, who is failing to adapt to his new life.
Then back in 1843 we encounter Horatio Lloyd, Diana's great-great grandfather, who is suspected of having murdered his wife and who is becoming increasingly obsessed with the pollution and unpleasant 'miasma', issuing from the River Peck that runs across the Rye on its journey to the Thames.
All three stories dovetail in a tragic but perfectly believable way, and the author cleverly hides various clues and coincidences within the narrative, leading up to a thrilling and ultimately satisfactory conclusion.
I played in the River Peck as a child, at the only spot where it now surfaces, at the top of Peckham Park ... it was lovely to re-encounter it as a central theme running through this brilliant story!

21/01/2025

My husband borrowed this from the library for me, because we're both Miranda fans and he thought I'd like it. Initially I gave it a go and declared that I wouldn't be able to stick with it, as I found the jokey, chatty style a bit too much, and the humour too scatological. But looking back, I think I was reluctant to engage with it precisely because so much of it mirrors my own life's experience - not the initial career success and fame of course, but the chronic fatigue and the inability to take life at the pace expected of me.
In Miranda's case, the ME triggered by Lyme Disease - a condition she was unaware she had, and which was repeatedly misdiagnosed - left her at times literally unable to get up off the floor, or out of bed for days. And this in turn triggered a complete reappraisal of her life choices and priorities.
Taking us gently and humorously through the ten 'treasures' she discovered during her long recovery period, Miranda imparts so much wisdom with such gracious humility that by the end of the book I was a little in love with her (and so glad that she has, finally, found true love along with a return to reasonable health). There are some of my favourite quotes:

'I had read, in palliative care worker Bonnie Ware's book The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, that the top regret was “Wishing I had the courage to live life true to myself, not the life that others expected of me”'

'Consider the boundaries you need to conserve your energy and operate at your best.'

'It's not like I have spent my life deliberately lying, but what the treasures of my darkness showed me is that all the micro lies are why I became, in many ways, untrue. All the following-along with the crowd when my heart was screaming for the opposite direction, all the agreeing with conventions that deep down didn't suit, all the accepting of values that didn't sit right, all the nos that needed to be yeses, all the yeses that needed to be nos. They all added up to not being fully honest with myself.'

If any of this speaks to you, then you might find this book really helpful - jokes about farting and nudity notwithstanding, there is a deeply spiritual message here, with profound psychological insights and plenty of references to back up the medical advice.

13/01/2025

A very enjoyable read, fast-paced and with a couple of good twists.
When Penny Whitlock's seventy-something parents refuse to downsize and leave their rapidly deteriorating home, she suggests they rent out their basement floor to provide some money for necessary repairs. A lodger is duly installed - Cooper Brownlow, an attractive man in early middle age - and Penny, recently divorced and with a son newly installed at University, initially finds herself drawn to him.
This proves to be a bad miscalculation; Cooper, it transpires, is on probation with a criminal record, and soon starts dealing drugs from her parents' house. Attempts to terminate his tenancy flounder, as Cooper ups the ante by refusing to pay rent for accommodation that he claims is not fit for habitation.
Distracted by concern for her parents, and for her son who now wants to quit University and return home, Penny finds herself in trouble at work, with her boss threatening dismissal - but this proves to be the least of her problems when a panicked call from her father brings her hurrying to the house to find Cooper Brownlow lying dead in the back garden.
From there on in, it's one nail-biting twist after another, as Penny is driven to doubt her parents, her son and her own sanity whilst desperately trying to deal with some intrusive questioning by the police. And then she finds that Cooper's partner in crime, a major drug dealer and dangerous thug, is on her case ... Gripping stuff, well written, with believable characters and an intriguing question mark at the end.

11/01/2025

What a perfect Christmas read - a cosy murder mystery starring the lovely Canon Daniel Clement (along with his redoubtable mother, Audrey, his actor brother Theo and all the other regulars from the parish of Champton St Mary).
Poor, put-upon Daniel not only has to celebrate three Christmas Masses - Midnight Mass, the early 8 o'clock Christmas Day Service and the main 10 o'clock - but has also been called upon, at very short notice, to help his mother host a Christmas lunch for ten, due to the cook up at Champton House being called away to tend to her sick sister. Cue Audrey running round like a headless chicken (or should that be turkey?), determined to serve up a feast worthy of consumption by the local gentry - Lord de Floures, his two bickering, grown-up offspring and his sister Jane, visiting with her American husband in tow - whilst guarding, at all costs, the secret ingredient of her famous bread sauce.
The very last thing the Clement family needs at such a time is for one of the guests to drop down dead in the middle of the celebrations ...
Reading this charming novella made me realise that I never got round to the third in Richard Coles Canon Clement series, Murder at the Monastery, so I'm going to remedy that asap!

05/01/2025

Based on the career of real-life 'Queen of Soho's clubland' Kate Meyrick, 'Shrines of Gaiety' features the redoubtable Nellie Coker, owner of five London nightclubs and newly released from Holloway prison for flouting the licensing laws of 1920s Britain - an activity that has hitherto been no problem for Nellie due to the protection of corrupt police officer Inspector Maddox of Bow Street.
Nellie's six children - WW1 survivor Niven, practical Edith, over-educated socialites Betty and Shirley, wannabe author Ramsey and eleven-year-old Kitty, are all primed to follow in their mother's footsteps, and to obey her every word - but as in all families, complications arise. The situation is further complicated by the arrival of erstwhile librarian Miss Gwendolen Kelling, down from Yorkshire on an errand of mercy - her friend's young sister Freda, along with her schoolfriend Florence, has absconded to the Big Smoke looking for fame and fortune in the theatrical world, and Gwendolen has made it her mission to find her.
Meanwhile decent, kindly Inspector Frobisher, intent on rooting our corruption at Bow Street Police Station, is becoming increasingly concerned about the number of deceased young girls being fished out of the Thames, and the exploitation of naive young women by the hedonistic and amoral pleasure industries of post-war London society.
When Frobisher and Gwendolen join forces, the Cokers are determined to keep a close eye on proceedings - but gradually discover that the real enemy is someone else entirely.
It's a complicated but very satisfying read, and distressing depictions of the exploitation of vulnerable girls are balanced by vividly drawn feisty women who champion female solidarity. And female solidarity prevails in the end! A great read.

31/12/2024

This novel is a tour de force! Set during WWI, it follows the fortunes of a group of public schoolboys as they firstly enthusiastically volunteer, and latterly, under conscription, are sent, to lead men and boys no more experienced than themselves into battles where they are routinely mown down as canon-fodder. It is told from the alternating perspectives of two such teenage officers: 18-year-olds Sidney Ellingham and Henry Gaunt, who as the horrors of the War unfold are finally able to admit their love for one another.
Alice Winn has obviously done meticulous research not only into the events of WWI but also into the manifestations and effects of PTSD on different characters and personalities. As Gaunt and Ellingham are separated - Gaunt, who bears the added complication of having a German mother and cousins fighting on the other side, ending up as a prisoner of war and taking part in a daring escape while Ellingham faces the horrors of the Somme believing his lover is dead - they react in different ways to the barbarities they have witnessed: Gaunt wakes shouting in the night from recurring nightmares, whilst 'Elly' becomes consumed with anger, oblivious to danger and described by his doctor as 'a machine'.
When peace is finally declared, most of Gaunt and Elly's schoolfriends are dead and their families back in England have no way of comprehending what they've been through. Is there any chance of a happy ending for these two haunted, damaged young men in an England where homos*xuality is still illegal?
A moving, visceral and ultimately inspiring read. The title, by the way, is taken from Tennyson's poem of the same name, dedicated to his friend Arthur Hallam.

25/12/2024

A beautifully observed, slow-paced, nothing-much-happens-but-whole-lives-are-changed novel about the residents of a rundown, post-WWII seaside town in the 1940s. The 'view of the harbour' changes according to the observer: local doctor Robert, his novelist wife Beth, their daughters Prudence and Stevie, each have their separate views; as does Beth's old schoolfriend, sophisticated divorcee Tory, lonely widowed Lily who is frightened of the waxworks she displays, and coarse, nosey invalid Mrs Bracey, bed-bound and dependent on her daughters Iris and Maisie and local curate Mr Lidiard for gossip and local updates. And into this rather turbulent mix comes middle-aged wannabe artist Bertram, gently flirting with several desperate females whilst lodging at the pub and making several attempts to paint - well, a view of the harbour!
Hearts are broken, deceptions are unearthed, death beckons and ambitions are thwarted as the advent of Summer fails to bring in the longed-for influx of visitors (who prefer to patronise the 'new town' just along the cliffs), and the various characters make desperate attempts to escape the monotony of their lives.
As pub landlord Ned muses, thoughtfully viewing Bertram's finally completed painting, 'Interesting ... what two people can make of the same view. We all see places a bit different to what the next man does. That stands to reason.'
So beautifully written, and so insightful about people's (and especially women's) interior lives. I shall definitely be reading some more of Elizabeth Taylor's writing.

17/12/2024

I'd seen the Merchant Ivory film, but never actually read the book before ... Initially written in 1913, and never published during E M Forster's lifetime at his own request, 'Maurice' tells the story of a young homos*xual man whose first love, fellow Cambridge student Clive Durham, insists on a platonic relationship and then forsakes him for marriage to a woman. After suffering torments of guilt, self-loathing and loneliness and following a failed course of treatment by a hypnotist, Maurice finally accepts his s*xuality and finds happiness with the Durham's gamekeeper, Alex Scudder.
The edition I read includes a 'terminal note' from the author, written in 1960, in which Forster emphasises how important it was to him to give Maurice and Alec a happy ending, but how this fact alone made it impossible to publish the novel, as all stories involving homos*xuality were supposed to end in tragedy as a moral lesson to the reader. Coupled with the fact that the s*x is nothing like as explicit as in, say, Lady Chatterley's Lover (which also features a member of the upper classes falling for a gamekeeper), and that Lady Chatterley WAS eventually deemed fit for publication, it's a sobering read from a present-day perspective.
There are references to 'inverts' and 'unspeakables of the Oscar Wilde type', and the perilous position of gay men in an era when intimacy between two men carried a prison sentence followed by lasting disgrace is made horribly clear. The only moderately sympathetic statement about homos*xuality is made by Maurice's hypnotist, who advises him to 'live in some country that has adopted the Code Napleon ... France or Italy, for instance. There homos*xuality is no longer criminal'
'You mean [says Maurice] that a Frenchman could share with a friend and yet not go to prison?'
'Share? Do you mean unite? If both are of age and avoid public indecency, certainly.'
'Will the law ever be that in England?'
'I doubt it. England has always been disinclined to accept human nature.'
This gloomy prediction is reiterated by Forster in the terminal note, where he anticipates that 'the Wolfenden recommendations will be indefinitely rejected, police prosecutions will continue and Clive on the bench will continue to sentence Alec in the dock. Maurice may get off.'
Fortunately in 1967 the Wolfenden recommendations WERE written into law, and s*x between consenting male adults was made legal. At least Forster, who died in 1970, lived to see it. 'Maurice' was finally published in 1971.

13/12/2024

Just read this for the second time, and was blown away by it all over again. The insight into a teenage autistic mind is both fascinating and heart breaking, as we follow Christopher Boone's attempts to solve the mystery of the murder of his neighbour's dog, uncovering a tragic family secret in the process.
I was gunning for Christopher from the outset, had my heart in my mouth as I followed his tortuous solo journey from Swindon to London, navigating a rail and underground system that I also find terrifying (I have OCD, which has some common factors with autism), and was praying that he'd finally get to take (and pass with flying colours) the Maths A Level that he'd set his heart on.
Plus Christopher is a fan of Sherlock Holmes, so what's not to like? A brilliant book that everyone should read!

10/12/2024

A cracking psychological crime thriller her, centred around teenage girls and sibling rivalry. Following a tragedy that shakes their community at Turtle Lake in California to the core, Finn Jackman and her father emigrate to England, where Finn struggles to come to terms with the loss of her older sister Izzy and beloved housekeeper-cum-surrogate mother Dita, and with the guilt she feels over her own involvement in what has now become known as the 'Turtle Lake Killing'.
Now a thirty-something adult, alcohol dependent and with her father in a care home, Finn is approached by a journalist who claims to have some missing information about the case - information that could shed fresh light on who, exactly, was really responsible for the 'Turtle Lake Killing'.
Does she really want to know, after all these years?
A fast-paced narrative with lots of red herrings makes this a really enjoyable read - though I was a bit disappointed by the ending, which seemed to me to be a bit of a damp squib after all the build-up and anticipation. Still, getting there was fun!

01/12/2024

A wonderful read, not least because of the breadth of meticulous research that must have gone into it - we learn so much about the burial customs of the Middle Kingdom of Ancient Egypt, about quantum physics, and about fine art, that it's practically an education in itself as well as a cracking good story!
Dawn McDowell has led two lives - firstly as an up and coming Egyptologist, part of an American team unearthing hidden burial chambers amidst the heat and dust of Egypt whilst falling in love with a fellow researcher - English aristocrat Wyatt Armstrong, brilliant, confident and arrogant; and secondly, as a wife and mother back in Boston, married to physicist and lecturer Brian, and training as a Death Doula to help terminally ill clients prepare for the inevitable. The reason for these two separate phases of Dawn's life lies in the death of her mother, which propelled her back to America from Egypt to care for her younger brother, and the pregnancy that then prevented her from returning to her academic career.
So far, these two timelines have been kept completely separate, due to the Arrow of Time. But what if they were to converge, and present her with a choice - which life would she choose?
This is a 'sliding doors' scenario, and the Two Ways of the title are the two routes by which the deceased was able to travel to the Afterlife, according to Middle Kingdom maps and inscriptions - the earth road, and the water road, with a lake of fire in between. The narrative slips from one life to another, and it's only towards the end that they dovetail and allow the reader to make sense of the timeline. The nature of death and the agony of love is explored in heart-breaking detail, and the ending is suitably oblique, basically leaving us to make up our own minds about which life Dawn eventually chooses.

25/11/2024

On reading this for the second time, I appreciated more fully how EM Forster's second novel started to explore two themes presented more dramatically in, for instance, 'Howards End' and 'A Passage To India' - middle-class morality regarding affairs out of wedlock and illegitimacy, and the effects of a spiritual and psychological crisis.
Young Rickie Elliot's 'Marabar Caves' experience takes place within the circles of Stonehenge, where his aunt casually and cruelly lets drop the bombshell that the young illegitimate ward, Stephen, to whom she's given a home is actually his half-brother. To Rickie - sensitive, philosophical, Cambridge-educated and newly married - this opens up a dark and uncomfortable awareness of what lies outside of his own ivory tower, and an obligation to interact with the sordidness of the real world.
Stephen Wonham himself is a handsome, straightforward, honourable but pugnacious young man who is absolutely without guile, and who, whilst aware of his illegitimate status, is reasonablu educated, respects himself and sees no reason to kowtow to those who may consider themselves his betters. His character is, apparently, based on Forster's own encounter with a shepherd lad in Wiltshire in 1904, three years before 'The Longest Journey' was published.
It takes the intervention of Rickie's maverick philosopher friend from his Cambridge days, Stewart Ansell, to make him realise that his half-brother has as much right to love and acceptance in life as he has himself, though the revelation that he is his mother's son, rather than his father's as Rickie has automatically presumed, almost breaks him.
It's a meandering, introspective read with a sad ending, and doesn't quite achieve the emotional authenticity of Forster's later writing, but it was, apparently, the author's favourite of his novels and as such I think it should be more widely appreciated.

18/11/2024

Loved this one! A swanky wedding is taking place on a remote island off the coast of Ireland - the bride, Jules, is an influencer who runs a successful online magazine, and the groom, Will is a reality TV star. The best man and the groomsmen are all old schoolfriends of Will's, alumni of Trevellyans, a boys' public school described at 'a cross between a prison camp and Lord of the Flies'. The sole bridesmaid is Jules' half-sister Olivia, a depressive, self-harming anorexic with a dark secret. The MC is Jules' old friend Charlie, suspected by his wife Hannah, invited as a 'plus one', of having once been more than just an old friend. And wedding planner Aiofe and her husband Freddy are really hoping that this celebrity wedding will be the one to launch their business into the big time.
However things are not quite what they seem, and while literal storm clouds gather on the horizon, we learn that all the above characters have histories that dovetail together, leading to tragedy in the aftermath of the wedding. But who could actually be capable of murder? Best man Johnno, who shares a terrible secret with Will harking back to their school days? Poor, unstable Olivia, who's still suffering from the abortion she was forced to have a few months ago? Fish-out-of-water Hannah, whose beloved sister was driven first out of University and then to su***de by a cruel ex circulating some revenge p**n? Or dark horse Aiofe, whose close family member is buried on the island, a young life cut tragically short?
The story is all about finding out, and it all gallops along at a cracking pace, making for an addictive read!

The Raven's Book Bunker