The Velvet Slipper

It’s 1934, and Edward Bradshaw is about to celebrate his fortieth birthday with all his family, friends and esteemed acquaintances in the south of Western Australia. Jocelyn Bradshaw has been working for months to provide her husband with a night that will distract him from her secret; a night that will make him pleased with her; that he will remember for years to come. Little does she know that before the night is out, she will be floating face-down and lifeless in the storm-tossed sea and her husband won’t be remembering anything at all.

In 2004, Penelope Waters is struggling to recover from a terrible loss. She finds herself flailing at work and takes a much-needed holiday to visit a friend in the south-west. A nearby imposing manor house soon captures her imagination with its air of mystique and the secrets that linger in the ancient walls and beautiful surrounding gardens. The kinship she feels with the occupants of the house, compounded by the arrival of an anonymous letter, compels her to the investigate the death of Jocelyn Bradshaw, who, many years earlier, fell from the sea cliffs onto the foaming rocks below. Together with Charles Bradshaw, an attractive young farmer and relative of the deceased woman, she searches for the missing answers to the many questions left behind: was Jocelyn’s death an accident, or was she pushed? And did her husband really die when he was thrown from his horse, or was it something more sinister?

Penny must dig through layers of memories to find the truth about that dark night, and as she does so she finds the courage within herself to face the memories that haunt her and to mend the relationships in her family.