The brand-new book in the award-winning, NYT bestselling Castle Knoll Murder Mystery series, in which Hollywood comes to Castle Knoll, and Annie Adams and her great-aunt Frances team up across decades to solve two interlocking murders
1970: The cast and crew for the supposed film of the year descends on Castle Knoll to begin production, and the influx of famous faces has the town abuzz. Newly married to the Lord of Gravesdown Hall, Frances Adams can’t help but get swept up in the glamour of it all. That is, until the lead actress has a breakdown, sabotage plagues the set, and rumors of hastily covered-up scandal abound. When the screenwriter tragically falls to his death from the cliffside paths, production is finally shut down. It’s obvious that the film is cursed.
Present day: Half a century later, the same film company is returning to Castle Knoll with fresh funds and a new cast and crew. Annie Adams knows the dark history of the previous production and is on her guard. When a body turns up in Castle Knoll cemetery, her instincts are proven right. She has long stopped believing in coincidences, so when her investigation uncovers links to the cold case that’s haunted Detective Rowan Crane for years, she knows she’s got to find the culprit before they strike again, and this time much closer to home.
Luckily, Annie is not easily rattled, and she’s got a secret weapon that puts her one step ahead of the mastermind at the center of this devious plot: her great-aunt Frances’s diary from the spring of 1970. But this time, Frances proves an unreliable narrator. Annie must figure out what exactly Frances is hiding in those pages, and who she felt was worth protecting, in order to stop history from repeating itself.
