On a cold December day in a northern countryside, a strange woman appears on the doorstep of the farmhouse Hugh Mercer is renting, warning him that a local named Elizabeth Goode is about to vanish under mysterious circumstances. Despite her ominous pleas for help, the former NYPD detective remains too preoccupied with the past he’s trying to escape back home in America and his affair with local police officer Alice Morrow. So, he simply dismisses the woman’s dire prediction.

But soon this strange woman’s desperate concerns become reality – and Mercer begins to realize that there is more to the seemingly ordinary Alice and the easy-going northern town she’s from. As Mercer and Alice work together to unravel this crime, they discover the dark history of all those involved and the desperation of those seeking revenge when forgiveness is not possible.

Shane Peacock is a novelist, playwright, journalist, and television screenwriter. His first book was a biography of the spectacular Canadian personality “The Great Farini,” his plays have been produced by the acclaimed 4th Line Theatre, and his documentaries have included Team Spirit, aired on the CTV national network. His best-selling series for young adults, The Boy Sherlock Holmes, has been published in ten countries in twelve languages and has found its way onto more than forty shortlists. It won, among other honors, the prestigious Violet Downey Award, The Arthur Ellis Award for crime fiction, the Ruth & Sylvia Schwartz Award, a Moonbeam Children’s Book Award Gold Medal, the Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction and The Libris Award. Each novel was also named a Junior Library Guild of America Premier Selection. The Ottawa Citizen said of the series, “More than just right, dazzlingly right for teen readers, is a new series by Ontario writer Shane Peacock. The vitality of Peacock’s creation of Sherlock is so inspired it feels like the writer is possessed, channeling Sherlock’s spirit.”

Shane Peacock's profile page

“Gripping and original … pick this one up and you won’t want to put it down!”

Shari Lapena, bestselling author of <i>The Couple Next Door</i>