A former Customs and Police Officer, Andrew Hill’s first book in a crime series set in the New Forest, where he lived for 30 years, will be published in Spring 2022. An avid reader across the crime genre and regular at crime writing festivals, he now lives in West Sussex and works in property.
Paul Cooper has a nice life. Fast car and boat, attractive wife and idyllic home on a small ocean-side town. But Paul has a secret and the story opens with him doing his best to keep his life from unravelling.
The author then takes us back to reveal how he came to be in this mess which centres around the internationally renowned multi-million selling author, the mysterious J T LeBeau.
There are no photographs of LeBeau. The only two people to have met him are both dead. He is faceless and has gone to extraordinary lengths to preserve his anonymity, and this forms the spine of the story.
Unbeknownst to Paul is that his wife Maria, has been conducting a clandestine affair with Daryl, a local beach bum. When Daryl and Maria search for a packet of cigarettes in Paul’s study; Paul’s secret becomes exposed. Paul Cooper is in fact the mysterious author, J T LeBeau.
The reader is then taken down a series of garden paths and into unexpected reveals. Just when you think you have a sight of the real truth, Steve Cavanagh disabuses you, and takes you on another helter-skelter ride.
This is a tour-de-force of storytelling, convoluted, clever and calculating. You will be constantly second guessing yourself, in the direction the author is steering you, but then the author skilfully whips the rug out from under your feet again, and again.
I cannot recommend this book too highly. I am not the only one as The Crime Writers Association awarded him the Gold Dagger in 2018 for a previous work The Liar.
