LOCAL GONE MISSING by Fiona Barton - Spotlight & Giveaway

 

Dark secrets are buried deep in the community of Ebbing, England in Fiona Barton's new novel, LOCAL GONE MISSING (Berkley). Locals and the weekends are at odds with each other. Weekenders are crowding the town and building huge homes in this once quaint seaside town and the locals don't appreciate the changes.

Elise King is a successful and ambitious detective—or she was before a medical leave left her unsure if she'd ever return to work. She now spends most days watching the growing tensions in her small seaside town of Ebbing. Elise can only guess what really happens behind closed doors. But Dee Eastwood, her house cleaner, often knows. She’s an invisible presence in many of the houses in town, but she sees and hears everything. 
 
The conflicts boil over when a newcomer wants to put the town on the map with a weekend music festival, and two teenagers overdose on drugs. When a man disappears the first night of the festival, Elise starts digging for answers. Ebbing is a small town, but it's full of secrets and hidden connections that run deeper and darker than Elise could have ever imagined. 

FIONA'S WORDS: 

My career has taken some surprising twists and turns over the years. I have been a journalist -

senior writer at the Daily Mail, news editor at the Daily Telegraph, and chief reporter at The Mail 

on Sunday, where I won Reporter of the Year at the National Press Awards, gave up my job to 

volunteer in Sri Lanka and since 2008, have trained and worked with exiled and threatened 

journalists all over the world.

But through it all, a story was cooking in my head.

The worm of my first book infected me long ago when, as a national newspaper journalist covering 

notorious crimes and trials, I found myself wondering what the wives of those accused really knew - 

or allowed themselves to know.

It took the liberation of my career change to turn that fascination into a tale of a missing child, 

narrated by the wife of the man suspected of the crime, the detective leading the hunt, the journalist

covering the case and the mother of the victim.

Much to my astonishment and delight, The Widow was published in 36 countries and made the 

Sunday Times and New York Times Best Seller lists.

It gave me the confidence to write a second book ,The Child, in which I return to another story that 

had intrigued me as a journalist. It begins with the discovery of a newborn's skeleton on a building 

site. It only makes a paragraph in an evening newspaper but for three women it's impossible to 

ignore.

The Child will be published in June 2017 and I am embarking on my next novel. My husband and I 

are still living the good life in south-west France, where I am writing in bed, early in the morning 

when the only distraction is our cockerel, Titch, crowing.

Thanks to Berkley Publishing we have one copy to giveaway. Just tell us about the last detective 

thriller you've read. We'll announce a winner soon. Good luck.

GIVEAWAY: USA only please