Carole Tyrrell worked in the theatre for nearly 10 years and was always fascinating by the way death and the supernatural formed many of the greatest and most enduring works. She has read crime fiction for many years and enjoys the broad range of the genre.
Rachel Caldwell leads a quiet life in the Lake District with her rescue dog, Brandy. She works at the local animal shelter and is the early stages of a romance with Alex, a local man. But when she finds a dead body in the woods when out for a walk with Brandy, she doesn’t call the police; instead, she runs back home and does nothing.
It’s not the first time she’s seen a murder victim and is her real name Rachel. Or is it, Casey? The naïve 19-year-old nanny to the Safran family in the US who she discovered, dead. She was convicted and of their murder and languished on Death Row for years until a successful campaign led to her release and return to the UK.
The Lake District seemed a safe haven. Until now.
Someone in Coldwater knows who she really is and when the body is identified as Alex’s estranged wife, all the clues seem to point to her [again].
Then, one of her scarves is found at the woodland murder scene, her real name appears in magnetic letters on her fridge and her past life comes tumbling out. The police and the media come knocking on her door and her peaceful life is shattered.
Is history repeating itself, or is she a pawn in someone else’s plans?
What really happened on that August day nearly 20 years ago in California when Casey became the so-called ‘Mary Poppins Killer’ in the eyes of the press? True-crime podcasts endlessly rehash and discuss the case with one respondent [in particular] is keen to find her again.
What’s their motive and are they linked to the case?
This was a cracking thriller.
It kept me guessing all the way through.
It’s a tale of a life lived in two halves; Casey in Los Angeles and an older Rachel, roughly 20 years later, in the UK. Though told in the first-person throughout, however it switches between them.
References such as the Spice Girls, Hotmail and Paris Hilton that pepper the novel evoked Casey’s era perfectly. The author effectively ratcheted up the suspense as eventually we find out what really happened on that horrific day.
Life on Death Row was realistically depicted as well as Casey being out of her depth as an untrained nanny embedded with in a family with secrets. Recommended.
