London, 1955. The bodies of three elderly recluses are found in a house in South Kensington. One of the victims is former society beauty Georgina Gresham, prime suspect in the notorious murder of her husband, James, almost thirty years earlier. Beside her lie the bodies of her brother Edmund and housekeeper Ada. The story behind these deaths takes us back to the late 1890s, to a prosperous and beautiful country house where children are playing in the garden. And then the youngest child, Freddie, is found with fatal head injuries ...Told through three narrators, this is a tight, claustrophobic piece of writing so authentic, so completely in period, that it's hard to believe it is not a true story.

Author Biography

Laura Wilson was brought up in London and has degrees in English Literature from Somerville College, Oxford and UCL, London. She has worked briefly and ingloriously as a teacher, and more successfully as an editor of non-fiction books. She has written history books for children and is interested in history, particularly of the recent past, painting and sculpture, uninhabited buildings, underground structures, cemeteries and time capsules. She lives with her partner and their basset hound in North Essex. Her first novel A LITTLE DEATH was shortlisted for both the CWA Ellis Peters and the Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original. A THOUSAND LIES was shortlisted for the 2006 Duncan Lawrie Dagger. THE LOVER won the 2004 Prix du Polar Europeen for Best Crime Novel of the Year In Translation and was also shortlisted for the 2004 Gold Dagger and the Ellis Peters Award.