The Fire Child
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3.8 • 12 Ratings
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
THE PERFECT HUSBAND. THE PERFECT STEPSON. THE PERFECT LIE?
"Tremayne...does a terrific job of building suspense until events reach their climax in the midst of a violent storm." -- Library Journal
When Rachel marries dark, handsome David, everything seems to fall into place. Swept from single life in London to the beautiful Carnhallow House in Cornwall, she gains wealth, love, and an affectionate stepson, Jamie.
But then Jamie's behavior changes, and Rachel's perfect life begins to unravel. He makes disturbing predictions, claiming to be haunted by the specter of his late mother - David's previous wife. Is this Jamie's way of punishing Rachel, or is he far more traumatized than she thought?
As Rachel starts digging into the past, she begins to grow suspicious of her husband. Why is he so reluctant to discuss Jamie's outbursts? And what exactly happened to cause his ex-wife's untimely death, less than two years ago? As summer slips away and December looms, Rachel begins to fear there might be truth in Jamie's words:
"You will be dead by Christmas."
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The pseudonymous Tremayne follows 2015's well-received The Ice Twins with a creepy contemporary thriller set on the isolated Cornish coast. Rachel Daly, who once thought of herself as a "feisty feminist," has given up her job and "supposedly exciting London life" to marry a widower, attorney David Kerthen, and live with him at Carnhallow, an 18-bedroom mansion that was built by the Kerthen family fortune, derived from the local tin mines. Carnhallow was partly restored by David's first wife, Nina, who died in a mine accident 18 months earlier. The household includes David and Nina's eight-year-old son, Jamie; David's mother, Juliet; and a housemaid, Cassie. With the mines no longer profitable, David commutes to a lucrative practice in London. Spooky mysteries abound. Jamie claims to hear his mother's voice and is sure she will return one day. The boy tells Rachel that Nina's body was never found and that the coffin in her grave is empty. The abandoned mines provide both a lure and an ominous backdrop with their long history of deaths, abuses, and wealth. Fans of gothic novels will relish this tale of tragedy and triumph.
