It's 1957 and Lewis Aldridge is travelling back to his home in the South of England. He is straight out of jail and nineteen years old. His return will trigger the implosion not just of his family, but of a whole community. A decade earlier, his father's homecoming casts a different shape. The war is over and Gilbert reverts easily to suburban life--cocktails at six-thirty, church on Sundays--but his wife and young son resist the stuffy routine. Lewis and his mother escape to the woods for picnics, just as they did in wartime days. Nobody is surprised that Gilbert's wife counters convention, but they are all shocked when, after one of their jaunts, Lewis comes back without her. Not far away, Kit Carmichael keeps watch. She has always understood more than most, not least from what she is dealt by her own father's hand. Lewis's grief and burgeoning rage are all too plain, and Kit makes a private vow to help. But in her attempts to set them both free, she fails to predict the painful and horrifying secrets that must first be forced into the open.
Sadie Jones was born in London, England, the daughter of a poet and an actress. Her father, Evan Jones, was born in Portland, Jamaica in 1927. He grew up on a banana farm, eventually moving to the United States, and from there to England in the 1950s. His most widely acclaimed work is "The Song of the Banana Man". Sadie's mother, Joanna Jones, was featured as an extra in various television series, including "The Avengers."
As a young woman, Sadie opted out of attending university, preferring instead to work an assortment of odd jobs (video production, temping, waiting tables) and to travel. After visiting America, the Caribbean and Mexico, Sadie settled in Paris, where she taught English and wrote her first screenplay. She eventually moved to London, where she currently resides with her husband, architect Tim Boyd, and their two children.
Sadie wrote screenplays for fourteen years before producing THE OUTCAST, her first novel. Her writing credits are an eclectic mix, everything from episodes of BBC-TV shows to a feature film in 2004.
