Synopsis: “#1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Jewell brings her signature dark, atmospheric suspense and sharp acuity to this new psychological thriller about a lost dog, a missing woman, and a mysterious house.

Jane Trevally is walking her dogs on her country estate one May afternoon when a small white dog appears. The teenaged girl that had been staying nearby with the dog is nowhere to be found, and Jane decides to return it to his registered owner hours away in London, in the deepest backwaters of Hampstead. But when Jane arrives, she is immediately unsettled—because she has a dark history with this house.

The man who answers the door tells her the dog, Hugo, must have been stolen from the Heath, but Jane very much doubts that is true. Through the window, she catches a glimpse of a haunted-looking woman, not the missing girl she’d hoped to find.

Facing a crossroads similar to the one that first led her to this home twenty-five years ago, Jane knows that the house holds the key—to the missing teenager, to the lost dog, and to dark secrets they’d all rather leave buried.”

My Review

I absolutely loved this latest thriller from Lisa Jewell, one of my favourite authors.

This was yet another of my most highly anticipated books of the year, and it was definitely worth the wait. It was another very dark book by Lisa Jewell, something she does so well.

I loved that Jane Trevally from Don’t Let Him In is the main character in this book. She’s such a great character, an older woman with serious baggage, but not things that hold her back, apart from a huge crumbling house in the country.

I loved that she teamed up with her stepson Dexter to return the dog and look for the missing girl, and then finds herself wanting to know more about the house where something very nasty could have happened to her years before.

As I mentioned before this is a very dark book full of tension, but also definitely a one more chapter book! If life hadn’t got in the way I’d have finished this within 24 hours, it was that much of a page turner.

Highly recommended if you enjoy dark domestic thrillers!

Book 16 of 20 Books of Summer 2026