The Scarlet Dress by Louise Douglas

☆☆☆☆
.ePUB, 347 pages
Expected Publication: February 18th 2021 by Boldwood Books

About the Book:
In the long, hot summer of 1995, twenty-two-year-old Alice Lang rents a caravan on a holiday park on the outskirts of the lively holiday resort of Severn Sands. She befriends Marnie, a shy, damaged little girl whose father is the park's caretaker and whose mother died a few months earlier. Will, whose mother runs the bar, falls in love with Alice, and is unbearably jealous of anyone else she sees. Tensions rise until one evening Alice disappears from her caravan. She's never seen again, and only her scarlet dress is found washed up on the shore. A quarter of a century later, the town is run down and nobody comes there anymore. Mr and Mrs deVillars, former owners of the holiday park, have passed the failing business onto their son Guy, who promptly sells the land for development. Builders clearing the land to create an expanse of executive homes uncover human bones. It has to be Alice. Will and Marnie’s lives were entirely shaped by what happened that summer, and now Alice has been found, they must struggle to pin down their memories, to escape the secrets of the past, the lies they told and the unbearable guilt they're both carrying. They need to find out what happened to Alice. Who killed her? And why?

My Review:

This is a slow burning murder mystery, that doesn't always work for me but Louise Douglas' writing is so engaging and beautiful I couldn't help but be sucked into the story...it also helped that the further I read the more the tension ramped up. Douglas writes with such confidence and compassion about difficult subjects and I enjoyed how it was very character driven.

Told not so much as a dual timeline but with some memories of the past...which are equally gripping. Having recently read the authors book "In Her Shadow" I was looking forward greatly to this one and in no way did it disappoint. Beautifully written and a real page turner I found it a fabulous read.

This was my second book by Ms. Douglas and I am so looking forward to reading more of her novels...a wonderful writer with so much talent that the book had me hooked from the first page. Thank you for such a brilliant story. 

I also must add that I love the covers of these new releases/re-releases.

Disclosure:
Thank you NetGalley, Louise Douglas and Boldwood Books for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an impartial review; all opinions are my own.

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