Synopses & Reviews
Six years ago, Melody Pieterson was attacked and left for dead. Only a chance encounter with a dog walker saved her life. Melody's neighbor and close friend David Alden was found guilty of the crime and imprisoned, and the attack and David's betrayal of her friendship left Melody a different person. She no longer trusts her own judgment, she no longer trusts her friends. In fact, she no longer really has any friends. Shes built a life behind walls and gates and security codes; shes cloistered herself away from the world almost entirely.
And then, soon after David is released from prison, Eve Elliot is murdered in an attack almost identical to Melodys. With the start of a new police investigation, Melody is suddenly pulled from her ordered, secluded life and back into the messy world around her. But as she learns more about Eve's murder, Melody starts to wonder if perhaps David hadnt betrayed her after all...if perhaps the killer is someone else entirely, someone whos still out there, preparing to strike again.
Narrated alternately by Melody and by Eves lingering ghost, The Life I Left Behind is a taut thriller and an intimate look at two young women bound together in ways neither of them could ever have predicted. Colette McBeth has proven once again that she is a master of suspense.
Review
"Colette McBeth digs deep into a childhood friendship that goes dangerously awry. What happens next will chill you to the bone.
Precious Thing will make you wonder about your own friends…and whether they just might be your worst enemies."—Tess Gerritsen
"[A] haunting first novel…McBeth imbues her characters with layers upon hidden layers, keeping readers guessing until the end."—Publishers Weekly
"[A] spellbinding thriller."—Kirkus
"Friendship, betrayal and secrets too big to bear: a book to race through, breathless, in a sitting."—Alex Marwood
"Keep your eyes peeled this summer for an astonishing new talent in the form of hack-turned-novelist Colette McBeth…Gone Girl but with a Brit voice."—David Mark
"This is a page-turner and no mistake. Dark, intriguing, and full of unexpected twists."—Lynn Shepherd
"An excellent debut, well-written, gripping and tense which skillfully weaves an unfolding nightmare with a dark past."—Cath Staincliffe
"The plot of Precious Thing is like a Catherine wheel, spinning faster and faster as it approaches its final twist, and there's quite a few to enjoy before you get there."—Clio Gray
"A brilliant, chilling debut. Psychopathy has never seemed so attractive."—Ali Knight
About the Author
COLETTE MCBETH was a BBC TV Crime Reporter for ten years. She lives in West London with her husband and three young children. She attended the Faber Academy Novel Writing Course in 2011. The Life I Left Behind is her second novel.