Saltwater Mansions

Margate is in the grip of a heatwave when David Whitehouse stumbles across the mysterious story of a local woman who lived on the ground floor of Saltwater Mansions, a block of flats not far from the sea. On paper, Caroline Lane was unremarkable. She paid her mortgage every month. She always paid her bills. But nobody had seen or heard from her for 13 years, and no one had ever come looking. She had disappeared completely.

David quickly becomes as fascinated by this missing woman as the residents of Saltwater Mansions, all of whom have their own theories to share, and their own unique stories to tell. As his obsession grows, David unearths vital clues that private detectives and amateur investigators alike have failed to spot. But the closer he gets to the truth, the clearer it becomes that this mystery was never meant to be solved, and that some stories don’t want to be told. What if this one was never about Caroline Lane at all?

From acclaimed and award-winning author David Whitehouse, Saltwater Mansions is an astonishing work of creative non-fiction blending reportage and memoir to explore the extraordinary hidden lives of ordinary people, the impact of grief, and the dangerous allure of taking true crime stories into our own hands.

Author Biography

David Whitehouse is the author of three acclaimed novels. His first, Bed, won the 2012 Betty Trask Prize 2012. His second, Mobile Library, won the 2015 Jerwood Fiction Prize. In 2022, his debut non-fiction book, About A Son, was shortlisted for The Gordon Burn Prize and the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction. His journalism has appeared in the Guardian, Esquire, The Times and many other publications, and he has also written extensively for the screen. He lives in Margate.