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Zusatztext “Regional mystery lovers! take note. A new heroine has come to town and her arrival is a time for rejoicing.” — Rapid River Magazine “Vicki Lane shows us an exotic and colorful picture of Appalachia from an outsider's perspective—through a glass darkly.” —Sharyn McCrumb “Lane is a master at creating authentic details while building suspense.” — Asheville Citizen-Times Informationen zum Autor Vicki Lane has lived with her family on a mountain farm in North Carolina since 1975. She is at work on an addition to the saga of Elizabeth’s Marshall County. Klappentext In a North Carolina winter! new vistas appear through the bare trees. For Elizabeth Goodweather of Full Circle Farm! still a newcomer after more than twenty years! one terrible glimpse ignites a mystery that reaches back years into these hills! drawing together dozens of seemingly unconnected lives. Elizabeth sees a frail old woman on a high porch where dolls hang by twine. When the woman jumps! and Elizabeth reacts! there is no turning back. Nola Barrett's ancient! sprawling house is spewing a dark past: of depravity! scandal and murder. Her land is at the center of multiple mysteries! ranging from a suspicious death to the brutal rape of a young woman to the legend of a handsome youth hanged for murder. But with Nola recovering from her self-inflicted wounds! Elizabeth has inherited her mad! violent drama—while a killer has a perfect view of it all.... Chapter One The Palimpsest Friday, December 1 The madwoman whispered into the blue shadows of a wintry afternoon. Icy wind caught at her hair, loosing it to whip her cheeks and sting her half-closed eyes. Pushing aside the long black strands, she peered through the fragile railing of the upper porch. Below, the fieldstone walkway with its humped border of snow-hooded dark boxwoods curled about the house. Beyond the walkway the land sloped away, down to the railroad tracks and the gray river where icy foam spattered on black rocks and a perpetual roar filled the air. Her hand clutching the flimsy balustrade and her gaze fixed on the stony path far below, the madwoman pulled herself to her feet. Behind her, a door rattled on its rusty hinges and slammed, only to creak open again. She paused, aware of the loom of the house around her—feeling it waiting, crouching there on its ledge above the swift-flowing river. The brown skeletons of the kudzu that draped the walls and chimneys rustled in a dry undertone, the once lush vines shriveled to a delicate netting that meshed the peeling clapboards and spider-webbed the cracked and cloudy windowpanes. From every side, in small mutterings and rustlings, the old house spoke. None escape. None. As the verdict throbbed in her ears, marking time with the pulse of blood, the madwoman began to feel her cautious way along the uneven planks of the second-story porch. A loose board caught at her shoe and she staggered, putting out a thin hand to the wall where missing clapboards revealed a layer of brick-printed asphalt siding, the rough material curling back at an uncovered seam. Compelled by some urgent desire, she caught at the torn edge, tugging, peeling it from the wood beneath, ripping away the siding to expose the heart of the house—the original structure beneath the accretions of later years. She splayed her trembling fingers against the massive chestnut logs and squeezed her eyes shut. A palimpsest, layer hiding layer, wrong concealing wrong. If I could tear you down, board by board, log by log, would I ever discover where the evil lies . . . or where it began? Resting her forehead against the wood's immovable curve, she allowed the memories to fill her: the history of the house, the subtext of her life. The logs have seen it all. Their story flowed into her, through her head and fingertips, as she leaned against...
