Erica Spindler on her new thriller: Don’t Look Back
The other day I was straightening my horrendously cluttered
desktop when I ran across an index card upon which I’d scribbled three words:
The Truth Is
I stared at the card, at those three words, no recollection of having written them, let alone why. It was definitely my handwriting. And I do such things, typically on post-its, which I stick on the edge of my desk. For some reason, however, this unremembered note carried more significance. Perhaps it was the index card? The weighty promise of those words?
I wondered at my reason for them. Had I been thinking of a plot point for my novel in progress? Or had I been working on a blog, interview or essay, such as the one I’m writing now? Perhaps I’d jotted them in a sudden moment of clarity? I’d come to an important truth about myself or my work, but was called away before I completed the thought.
The Truth Is
As I studied the words, I realised how utterly appropriate they were in light of my upcoming novel, Don’t Look Back. Don’t Look Back was inspired by two recent high profile murder trials: the Amanda Knox and Casey Anthony cases. In both, the defendants acted bizarrely in the wake of the crime: Amanda Knox giggled and sat on her boyfriend’s lap while waiting to be interviewed by police; Casey Anthony went out dancing and got a celebratory tattoo while her daughter was missing. Does either prove murder?
Of course not. But they sure looked guilty.
The Truth Is
What is truth? What we believe we know? What we feel in our gut is true? What ‘looks’ true? In the absence of solid physical evidence, how much circumstantial evidence is necessary to prove guilt beyond a shadow of a doubt?
Don’t Look Back was born out of those questions. And another: what happens if you’re innocent but no one believes you? Not when you’re charged. And not when you’re acquitted.
In Don’t Look Back my protagonist, Katherine McCall, lived that scenario. At seventeen, she awakened to find her sister in a pool of blood, brutally murdered. Kat looked guilty and was quickly charged, tried and . . . acquitted.
As the book opens, Kat is no longer a shell-shocked and vulnerable teenager, but a woman determined to emerge from the cloud of suspicion that’s hung over her for ten long years. Years spent in hiding, falsely accused while her sister’s killer roamed free. Knowing her allies will be few, she returns to Liberty, Louisiana on a mission: to uncover the truth and no matter the cost, to finally get justice.
Erica’s utterly compelling and compulsively readable new thriller, Don’t Look Back, is out now.
'I don't know why you came back to Liberty, Ms. McCall, but little towns have long memories. People don't forget. You'd be wise to keep that in mind.'
Some secrets won't stay buried . . .
Ten years ago, Kat McCall left her home town in Louisiana after being accused of murdering her sister. Now, despite the fact there are those in the town who are still convinced of her guilt, she has returned, determined to unearth the real killer.
With the help of police officer Luke Tanner, Kat starts to get to the truth about who really killed her sister, but there are plenty of people who don't like her digging up secrets from the past...
Utterly gripping and compulsively readable, Don't Look Back is the sensational new thriller from internationally bestselling author Erica Spindler.
