It’s about a former prisoner who, at the behest of his probation officer and to occupy his time now he is going straight, looks into an episode from his childhood where his English teacher took his remedial English class out for the day and then disappeared. We have everything from sucking up to back stabbing, from lies to fantasising, from nefarious deeds to cover ups and it’s left to the reader to spot the many red flags those involved raise via their words. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. Those involved are in a small community and are fundraising for cancer treatment for a young child with a brain cancer and also taking part in an am dram production.

very excited to hear earlier this year that Hallett was writing a follow up to her debut mystery The Appeal (2021), which is my favourite book by her to date. I think the author handles this aspect of the book effectively, as I felt in a short space of time several distinct voices emerge, even if they only contribute a small occasional message or two. If one piques my interest, I then usually wait until one of my hardier blogging friends has read it, to see if it is worthwhile getting. The couple owns the Grange Golf and Country Club and are instrumental in forming the Fairway Players, an amateur drama society.I recommend this to readers prepared to scour tons of innocuously written documents to discover a murderer. While at times somewhat overwhelming thanks to the large cast of characters and often seemingly superfluous clues, I stuck at it and I’m so very glad that I did. Turns out, although there are a LOT of characters, once you get into the flow of the story, the key players easily stand out, as their correspondence is much more frequent. I’ve always thought that text often “gets lost in translation”, however within a couple of chapters of The Appeal I was able to visualise the full cast of the book. The story centres around 2 major plot lines - one is the local amateur drama society and their upcoming production (you wouldn’t believe all the drama - pun intended) and the other is a fund raising appeal to help pay for expensive experimental treatment for a 2 year old girl with a brain tumour.

Thanks to the vast amount of details and the number of characters hiding secrets and lies, I was thoroughly unsuccessful.And as he prepares for the appeal, he presents two of his star pupils with additional written evidence that came to light after the trial and the guilty verdict. Martin Hayward runs the group and, along with his son James, directs the shows, while his wife Helen and daughter Paige are the perennial leading ladies while everyone else is vying for the best supporting roles, both on and off stage. Given the length of the book, the author wisely disperses new plot twists and turns effectively without revealing too soon which path the overall narrative will take, and this is helped by the fact that actions often have more than one interpretation. Even though it started slow, it picks up in the middle so you gotta keep your patience and it’s fully worth it! When working only with computer paperwork, one is confronted with hidden identities, falsehoods and resentments regarding other suspects.