Leave the Lights On
A Novel
-
- £10.99
Publisher Description
Perfect for fans of Wendy Walker and Samantha Downing, in this thrilling domestic suspense novel, a woman fights to hide her secrets as her life's idyllic façade begins to fall apart.
Cape Morgan, Maine, is the utopian ideal for a charmed life, and Beatrice Wicker knows it. The multi-million-dollar house on the sea coast. The joint bank accounts. The safety and security that go along with being married to an esteemed architect and community leader. The scenic coastline, perfect for her ambitious plan to turn an abandoned asylum into an artists’ retreat. So what if her husband sneaks off to see his second family now and again? Beatrice is willing to look the other way. It’s simply the price she must pay to keep their life together.
Josh doesn’t realize that Beatrice knows about his other life. That’s just one of Beatrice’s secrets. And now, that truth—along with a deadly host of other secrets from the past—is about to upend their false paradise.
When there’s an explosion at the local elementary school playground, and a two-year-old boy is abducted, it doesn’t take Beatrice long to make the connection between the missing boy and her husband. It was the son from Josh’s other life who was kidnapped, and Josh can’t do anything about it without revealing the truth.
Helping Josh find his son would destroy the façade of her perfect marriage and could put more children’s lives in danger. But that’s not all. It would reveal her deeper secret: Beatrice Wicker is not who she claims to be.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Andersson's follow-up to 2022's Little Red House is a tense story of domestic suspense. Beatrice Wicker lives in Cape Morgan, Maine, with her wealthy husband, Josh, a well-liked architect whom she knows is unfaithful. Her life is upended one afternoon when someone sets off an explosive at the local elementary school and an 18-month-old boy is abducted in the confusion. Beatrice quickly realizes that the missing child is Oliver, Josh's son with another woman, and his apparent kidnapping threatens to disclose Beatrice's own hidden past: the grotesque doll left behind on the school playground is intended as a message for Emma Strand, her true identity. Flashbacks explore why Emma changed her name and how her dark past may be tied to the explosion and abduction; in the present, Josh tries to lead the search for Oliver while keeping his connection to the boy a secret. Andersson smoothly alternates between timelines, whipping Emma and Josh's mutual deceits into a satisfying climax with plenty to say about the compromises of matrimony. Fans of Sally Hepworth will enjoy themselves.
