The Night Sister
A Novel
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- £0.99
Publisher Description
The latest novel from New York Times best-selling author Jennifer McMahon is an atmospheric, gripping, and suspenseful tale that probes the bond between sisters and the peril of keeping secrets.
Once the thriving attraction of rural Vermont, the Tower Motel now stands in disrepair, alive only in the memories of Amy, Piper, and Piper's kid sister, Margot. The three played there as girls until the day that their games uncovered something dark and twisted in the motel's past, something that ruined their friendship forever.
Now adult, Piper and Margot have tried to forget what they found that fateful summer, but their lives are upended when Piper receives a panicked midnight call from Margot, with news of a horrific crime for which Amy stands accused. Suddenly, Margot and Piper are forced to relive the time that they found the suitcase that once belonged to Silvie Slater, the aunt that Amy claimed had run away to Hollywood to live out her dream of becoming Hitchcock's next blonde bombshell leading lady. As Margot and Piper investigate, a cleverly woven plot unfolds—revealing the story of Sylvie and Rose, two other sisters who lived at the motel during its 1950s heyday. Each believed the other to be something truly monstrous, but only one carries the secret that would haunt the generations to come.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Bestseller McMahon (The Winter People) combines suspense with fantasy in this convoluted tale. Amy Slater apparently murders her husband and son before killing herself at the Tower Motel in London, Vt., where she grew up. An old photograph with a cryptic note is the sole clue to the crime. Only Amy's childhood friends, sisters Margot and Piper, understand the note's reference to a secret that shattered their friendship with her years earlier. Refusing to believe Amy capable of murder, Margot and Piper delve into the motel's past and the troubled Slater history which includes Amy's aunt's unsolved disappearance. The story moves, not always seamlessly, from the present to 1989, when the girls discover a skeleton in a hidden room, and to the 1950s, when Amy's mother and aunt were growing up. Teenage Amy is vivid and engaging, but other characters are not as well drawn. McMahon effectively creates an atmosphere of horror, and readers willing to entertain magic realism in their mysteries may find the Slaters' secrets compelling.
