Death of the Day

When Steven Grace vanishes, leaving only the evidence of his broken car in a ditch, ripples of suspicion spread across the Sussex town of Seatree. Is anything what it seems? Detective Chief Inspector Knox thinks not, and he and his unusual sidekick, D.I. Rawthorn, find plenty on their hands to keep them awake during this long sleepless night. Jula, Steven's beautiful and oblique partner, appears to dislike Steven, as does her close companion, the tough Jack Hastings. Markessa though, the family friend, appears to have liked Steven far too much. Meanwhile the haunted, frightened Leigh, who has returned to Seatree on some mysterious quest of her own, provides other elements to complicate the case further. Why, for one, does the large house in historical Divers Lane - the house of white carpets and a ceiling painted like a sky - present such a sinister aspect? Here live the Alliats, timid Miranda who, in her youth, might have passed for an English Marilyn Monroe, and wealthy, busy George, with his big liver-spotted hands and white tombstone teeth. Lit up night-long, the Alliat residence, like a doomed lighthouse, seems to be sending rays of trouble and ancient menace in all directions, as something reaches towards the present from the far past. When a body is finally found - only the first of several - a domino effect begins that will topple many lives in ruins. Contained between sunfall and dawn of a single night, Death of the Day sets out to investigate not only a string of bizarre deaths, but the facades behind which men and women exist. It is very much a detective novel, darkly lighted and ominously rich.