Nine-year-old Samuel lives alone in a once-great estate in Cornwall with the family's housekeeper, Ruth, who runs their home with an iron fist. His father is dead and his mother has been abroad for months, purportedly tending to her late husband's faltering business. She left abruptly one night while Samuel was sleeping and did not say goodbye. Beyond her sporadic postcards, Samuel hears nothing from his mother. As rumors in town begin to swirl, Samuel wonders whether something more sinister is afoot. Perhaps his mother did not leave, but was murdered--by Ruth. Artful and haunting, The Boy at the Keyhole is an incandescent debut about the precarious dance between truth and perception and the shocking acts that occur behind closed doors.

Author Biography

Stephen Giles is the author behind the Ivy Pocket children's series, which has been translated into twenty-five languages. He lives in Australia. The Boy at the Keyhole is his first work for adults.