The Quiet Girls: An absolutely addictive mystery thriller
Page 26
In a desperate race against time, Carrie vows to bring Jordan home safely, and catch this killer before he can strike again. She’ll never stop searching, for the grieving families, for her belief in justice, and her hope that, one day, something she finds will lead her back to her lost little sister.
If you love Val McDermid, Robert Dugoni or Angela Marsons you won’t be able to put down this dark and twisty thriller. J.M. Hewitt will keep you guessing until the very last page.
Author’s Note
It may surprise some readers when I say the setting for this novel – Pomona Island – actually exists in real life.
A narrow strip of land nestled between Salford and Trafford, Pomona has a rich and exciting history. During the Industrial Revolution, Pomona Island was home to the Royal Pomona Palace, a venue bigger than the Albert Hall, with a capacity to hold 30,000 people. Sadly the palace was damaged beyond repair in 1887, as a consequence of an explosion in a nearby chemical factory. Originally known as Cornbrook Strawberry Gardens, in the 1800s it also housed an impressive Botanical Garden. The island was renamed Pomona after the Roman Goddess of fruit.
In 1974, a nightclub was opened on Pomona, aboard a decommissioned passenger ferry, brought up from the Isle of Wight and moored dockside. It proved so popular the owners brought in an old RAF aircraft to act as an overflow restaurant and dance floor. As part of the network of Manchester canals, it has also been a thriving dockland site.
I have used creative licence with the Pomona in my book. In The Quiet Girls, access to Pomona is near impossible; the only way of getting on the island is by an experienced boatman, battling against the currents. In real life, there is a footbridge from Pomona Tram Stop, and by Cornbrook Tram Stop you can go through a gap in a fence to access the island. Pomona is also not set as far back from the bright lights of Manchester city as this book leads you to believe.
Today, the real Pomona is a wasteland of flora, fauna and concrete. The bridges and brick walls are a canvas for street artists. It is the shadow of industry, overtaken by nature and wilderness. Used needles and discarded sleeping bags lie side by side with the various species of wildlife, such as the Brimstone butterfly, kestrels, lapwing, skylark. Fifty pairs of sand martins have been recorded, nesting in the dock walls; pochard ducks are listed, a species now on the globally vulnerable list. Ospreys, sparrowhawks, indeed over one hundred separate birds make their home here, and over one hundred and fifty types of plant life have also been recorded.
Proposals for several hundred new flats to be built on Pomona Island have been approved, construction has started. Soon, this hidden gem, this little oasis in the midst of urban city life will be gone, replaced by nineteen-storey high-rises, retail, leisure and commercials units, and Pomona will be no more.
Manchester Waters – Pomona’s new name – will be there instead. But the history, the stories, the graffiti and the photographs will remain, as will my own version of Pomona, within the pages in this book.
Hear More From J.M. Hewitt
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Books by J.M. Hewitt
DETECTIVE CARRIE FLYNN SERIES:
The Night Caller
The Quiet Girls
The Hunger Within
Exclusion Zone
A Letter from J.M. Hewitt
I want to say a huge thank you for choosing to read The Quiet Girls.
While writing this book, I became very interested in the increasingly popular survivalist lifestyle. People around the world are planning for the apocalypse, for war, or simply wanting to go off-grid. It intrigues me greatly, as does choosing to live in a self-sufficient manner. As most novels usually are, this one was born from a question; what would it take for you to give up everything and live off the land? For Harry, it was his beloved daughter, Melanie, and the narrow escape she experienced with the near-abduction. He figured if they lived a solitary life this wouldn’t be an issue. Little did he realise that he was only propelling her straight into an even more intense danger.
If you did enjoy it, and want to keep up to date with all my latest releases, just sign up at the following link. Your email address will never be shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.
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I hope you enjoyed The Quiet Girls and if you did I would be very grateful if you could write a review. I’d love to hear what you think, and it makes such a difference helping new readers to discover one of my books for the first time.
I love hearing from my readers – you can get in touch on my Facebook page, through Twitter, Goodreads or my website.
Thanks,
J.M. Hewitt
www.jmhewitt.com
Books by J.M. Hewitt
DETECTIVE CARRIE FLYNN SERIES:
The Night Caller
The Quiet Girls
The Hunger Within
Exclusion Zone
Acknowledgements
Writing a novel is a team effort, and I’ve most certainly got a great team with me. Huge thanks as always to Maisie, my fantastic editor, without whom this book wouldn’t be in half the shape that it is. Also thanks to Noelle Holten and Kim Nash who work so hard on publicising the brilliant novels that Bookouture put out there. The whole Bookouture team are an absolute joy and I’m so grateful to be a part of it.
My agent, Laetitia, of Watson Little, who works tirelessly alongside me and is always there at the end of the phone or email. Your advice and knowledge are amazing, I count my lucky stars constantly to be a part of your fantastic collection of authors.
My girls; Vic, Lou, Lisa, Kim, Heidi, Ruth, Susi, Jane, Vicky – I’m so lucky to have a friendship circle made up of such strong, brilliant, resilient women.
My family; my parents, Janet and Keith and my brother, Darren. Jordan, Eloise, Emily and little Dawson – you’re all fabulously supportive and I’m eternally thankful to be one of the ‘Hewitt’ clan! And my little Marley, my constant friend and writing companion.
Thank you to Professor Stuart J. Marsden of Manchester Metropolitan University for his valuable information on the wildlife on Pomona Island.
The crime fiction community; the writers and the bloggers and the publishers –is such a wonderful place to be and I may not see you all the time but when we do meet up it’s simply fabulous.
Finally, a huge thank you to the readers, it’s thrilling that you enjoy my books. As long as you keep reading, I’ll keep writing!
Published by Bookouture in 2019
An imprint of StoryFire Ltd.
Carmelite House
50 Victoria Embankment
London EC4Y 0DZ
www.bookouture.com
Copyright © J.M. Hewitt, 2019
J.M. Hewitt has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publishers.
eBook ISBN: 978-1-78681-876-8
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events other than those clearly in the public domain, are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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