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HAVEN’T THEY GROWN
All Beth has to do is drive her son to his Under-16s away match, watch him play, and bring him home.
Just because she knows that her former best friend lives near the football ground, that doesn’t mean she has to drive past her house and try to catch a glimpse of her. Why would Beth do that, and risk dredging up painful memories? She hasn’t seen Flora Braid for twelve years.
But she can’t resist. She parks outside Flora’s house and watches from across the road as Flora and her children, Thomas and Emily, step out of the car. Except…
There’s something terribly wrong.
Flora looks the same, only older – just as Beth would have expected. It’s the children that are the problem. Twelve years ago, Thomas and Emily Braid were five and three years old. Today, they look precisely as they did then. They are still five and three. They are Thomas and Emily without a doubt – Beth hears Flora call them by their names – but they haven’t changed at all. They are no taller, no older.
Why haven’t they grown?
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REVIEWS
“Sparkling…a marvellous creation’.”
Sunday Times
“Hannah is one of our most courageous crime writers, a literary high-wire artist who sets herself the toughest of challenges in inventing inexplicable mysteries that she must create plausible solutions for. Here she pulls it off beautifully.”
Sunday Express
“Hannah has always excelled at the knotty, impossible twist and Haven’t They Grown is as complex and sinister as ever.”
The Observer
“One of this country’s most accomplished writers and one of the few who could pull off such an impossible sounding mystery. It is testament to Hannah’s skill that she creates such a convincing narrative, cleverly manages the suspense and deals with so many contemporary themes. And she hasn’t lost her knack for sending the reader in the wrong direction.”
Daily Mail
“Ingenious…delivers twists and turns at every corner”
heat magazine
“SO clever, so gripping: Hannah asks her readers an impossible question and answers it with style. I tore through Haven’t They Grown. Brilliant characters and a corker of an ending. Bravo!”
Gillian McAllister
“From the impossible premise to its chilling conclusion, Haven’t They Grown is a masterpiece in plotting. Hannah’s writing is darkly funny and brilliantly observed – I adore her books.”
Clare Mackintosh