One Puzzling Afternoon

"A clever, keep-‘em-guessing murder mystery, an empathetic yet realistic portrayal of the toll dementia takes, and a meditation on how the brain can bury the most tragic memories...An outstanding must-read." —Booklist, STARRED review

One glimpse can unlock six decades of silence.

When eighty-four-year-old Edie Green sees her childhood friend Lucy—vanished without a trace in 1951—walking down the street as if nothing has changed, her family chalks it up to confusion. But Edie is sure of what she saw. As her memories fade, one truth stays with her: she holds the key to what happened all those years ago.

Moving between Edie’s youth in post-war Cornwall and her present-day search for answers, One Puzzling Afternoon is a haunting, character-driven mystery about friendship, long-buried secrets, and the enduring imprint of the past. As she retraces the steps of a vanished summer, Edie must face what time has buried— and what she’s never been able to let go.

Set in a quiet English town and layered with memory, grief, and emotional truth, this poignant dual-timeline story explores how far we’ll go to hold on to the people and moments that shaped us.