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Content snapshot
Flag an inaccuracy →What's in this book, at a glance — five things readers want to know before they start.
Violence
Some
A death by vehicle; historical child death that is the source of the present mystery
Language
Barely any
Mild language
Sexual Content
Barely any
Some adult romantic content in the backstory
Substance Use
Barely any
Social drinking
Emotional Intensity
A lot
The relationship between what we cannot remember and who we become; a family organized around protection of a secret rather than each other
What this book is about
Gideon Davies is one of England's most celebrated young violinists — and he can no longer play. Worse, the events of his early childhood have become inaccessible to him, blocked by something he cannot identify. When a woman is run down in a London street, her death begins to connect to a musical family's buried history, and to a tragedy that happened when Gideon was very young. Elizabeth George's eleventh Lynley mystery is her longest and most psychologically ambitious: a dual investigation (Lynley's procedural, Gideon's therapy sessions) converging on a crime that happened before Gideon could understand it. One of the series' richest explorations of repressed memory and family silence.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
eleventh of the Lynley series — series context helps significantly
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