Traces of Alys

1995: 15-year-old Emma sends her family a bunch of flowers and disappears. Her best friend Kate blames herself. That night in west Wales, Idris and his son find a crashed car, a teenage girl and a man trying to kill her. The girl can't remember who she is. Their neighbour says it's her missing daughter, Alys, finally home, and takes her in. Twenty years later, a body is found in a carpark where Emma was last seen. Kate believes that she has, at last, found the end of Emma's story; instead, it is only the beginning, as finally secrets will have to be faced. A family mystery about escaping, finding home, and what - or who - is left behind.

A runner-up in the Bridport Novel Prize and longlisted for the Curtis Brown First Novel Prize.