PINTEREST
BLOGLOVIN
GOODREADS
You can run away from your life.
But you can’t run away from murder.
When her family tragedy is splashed across the newspapers, Nancy decides to disappear. Her grandmother’s beautiful Regency house in a quiet seaside village seems like the safest place to hide. But the old house has its own secrets and a chilling wartime legacy . . .
Now someone knows the truth about the night Nancy’s mother and stepfather were murdered. Someone knows where to find her. And they have nothing to lose . . .
So what really happened that night? And how far will she go to keep it hidden?
Publisher: Penguin UK Books
Format: Ebook (15 June 2023), Audio, Paperback (22 June 2023)
Source: Copy to review
MY THOUGHTS
My thanks to Ellie of Penguin for the tour invite and copy to review. I’ve always enjoyed Jane’s thrillers, some of which are reviewed on this blog and with Coming to Find You, she has combined a gritty thriller with WW2 historical fiction leading to a dual time story that is suspenseful but with an emotive undercurrent.
The story begins in the present day with Nancy and a murder. In the aftermath of a family tragedy, she retreats to a family home, ‘Tall Chimneys’ on the coast in Sidmouth, Devon. Her life has changed completely, she has be careful who she can trust and her hopes to lay low and avoid the press are thwarted – it seems the house may not be the safe haven she expected.
Tall Chimneys is almost a character in its own right as it is included in both timelines. The imposing Regency building has seen a lot of history, both as a boarding house under Elizabeth’s ownership and also as a place of trauma for Nancy.
There may be many decades between the main characters and events but there are parallels with both stories – controlling characters, guilt and murder. It is apparent that Nancy is someone with a troubled backstory and I felt convinced from quite early on that there were more revelations to come from her part in the story. Every so often there are teasing snippets of ‘The Night of the Murder’ – as the book progresses, these get more detailed and a great way of ramping up the tension and suspicion.
Whilst I enjoyed both timelines it was Elizabeth’s wartime story from 1941 that I found the most compelling. Her friendship with Adeline, her unhappy marriage and the compassion she showed not only to the two young evacuee girls, Maisie and Shirley, but others too despite her own suffering, made her a sympathetic and engaging character. The detail about the secret army added a level of jeopardy and with both Nancy and Elizabeth’s chapters frequently ending on cliffhangers, I was hooked and desperate to know what happened next!
With well developed characters, a fantastic sense of place and plenty of tension and suspense, Coming to Find You was extremely enjoyable and addictive. I do hope there will be more historical writing from Jane Corry.
Finally, on a completely separate note – and a complete coincidence, this is the second book I’ve read this week which mentions a wartime British evacuation ship sunk by a U-boat torpedo – The SS City of Benares!
Jane Corry is a former magazine journalist who spent three years working as the writer-in-residence of a high security prison for men. This often hair-raising experience helped inspire her Sunday Times-bestselling psychological dramas, My Husband’s Wife, Blood Sisters, The Dead Ex, I Looked Away, I Made A Mistake, The Lies We Tell andWe All Have Our Secrets, which have been translated into over 16 languages and sold over a million copies worldwide. Jane was a tutor in creative writing at Oxford University; an RLF Fellow at Exeter University; and is a regular contributor to the Daily Telegraph and My Weekly magazine. Her eighth novel is set for publication in summer 2023.
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