Cruel Habitations

by Kate Charles

Overview

April 1989: sisters Alison and Jacquie Barnett take a holiday to Greece that neither of them will ever forget.

When Jacquie's father dies, she discovers he has split everything equally with her sister, whom no one has seen for eleven years. And Jacquie, desperate for the money, has no choice but to try to trace her. It is a journey that takes her to Westmead, and stirs old emotions that will once more put lives in danger . . .

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781405523462
Publisher:	Little, Brown Book Group
Publication date:	11/30/2012
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	529,554
File size:	723 KB

About the Author

Kate Charles, a past Chairman of the Crime Writers' Association and the Barbara Pym Society, is American by birth but has lived in England for many years. A former parish administrator, she sets her books against the colourful backdrop of the Church of England.

She has been co-organiser of the annual St. Hilda's Crime and Mystery Conference in Oxford since its beginnings in 1994 and was awarded the George N. Dove Award for her 'outstanding contribution to the serious study of mystery and crime fiction'. She lives on the English side of the Welsh borders with her husband and their Border Terrier.

Editorial Reviews

With her rich cast of well-developed characters and eloquent prose, British author Charles (Strange Children; Unruly Passions; etc.) once again creates an absorbing mystery sure to appeal to traditional Anglophiles. Sophie and Chris Lilburn leave their London life for the cathedral town of Westmead, where Chris will teach history in the cathedral school and be lay clerk in the cathedral choir. Living in a rent-free house in Quire Close, two rows of stone medieval terraced houses, in the shadow of the majestic cathedral should be idyllic, but for Sophie it's anything but. Due to her inability to have a child, her loving relationship with Chris begins to deteriorate. Sophie has little in common with her neighbors, particularly the lecherous Leslie Clunch, retired verger, and the arrogant Elspeth Verey, widow of the prior dean and dictator of Westmead's social standards. Sophie finds her only distraction is contemplating the unsolved murder of an unidentified young woman who was killed in the town 11 years earlier. When Jacquie Darke arrives in Westmead in search of her long-missing sister, Alison, Sophie joins Jacquie in uncovering what lies behind the town's prim and proper fa ade. Cold rain, gallons of tea and eccentric characters generate a cozy Barbara Pym-like atmosphere, while caf latte, mobile phones and the problems of modernizing medieval houses root the story firmly in the present. This is for genteel readers who appreciate a hint of sex. Agent, Carol Heaton. (May 15) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly