"They will call us 'The Quiet People'. It's a name we coined from neighbours who talk to reporters and say things like, 'we can't believe he killed his boss. He was always so quiet, always keeping himself to himself."
Lisa and Cameron Murdoch are the ultimate power couple - happily married with a beautiful son in New Zealand, and a successful crime writing duo topping the bestseller lists worldwide together. Like they always say - nobody knows crime like they do.
Maybe they know it a little too well, in fact.
When their seven year old son goes missing after yet another heated argument, there's no trace of him - he's disappeared. It's like he was taken by a ghost. And while Lisa and Cameron grieve, the police and their fans can't help but wonder if he isn't missing at all, if the couple have finally proved what they've said all along and committed the perfect crime.
"I have the urge to tell him that I kill people like him for living. That if anyone here could get away with murder, it'd be me. Instead of doing any of that, I get into the car and we drive away."
This was one of those slow-burning stories where you can feel the embers deep in your stomach, waiting, clinging on until you can know something, anything. Until the fire starts to rage out of control and there's nothing you can do but watch it burn.
Everything at first seems almost too easy to solve - it seems clear. But then Cleave proves himself to be a master manipulator, throwing us off the scent constantly and leaving us in shock when the unexpected constantly happens. Full of quiet discomfort, this story will leave you looking for clues in every page you read from now on.
The characters were strange, intriguing. I can't even say I liked them exactly but they enchanted me. They held me with a morbid curiosity and didn't let go. Told from mostly Cameron and Detective Kents points of view, we get just enough information about the characters to keep us close to them but never too close.
Even the side characters were so beautifully, dynamically complex - Ellen being my favourite. I fully fell in love with her and she will be in my head for quite some time, she may be the character that's impacted me the most in such a long time.
"Good people do bad things. Bad people do good things. I don't know where you are in that equation."
Content Warning: This book contains references to murder, kidnap, molestation and death.
Thank you to the publishers and Anne at Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in this tour. I was gifted a reviewers copy of this title in return for honest feedback.
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