A Child's Book Of True Crime by Chloe Hooper

 

Kate Byrne has just graduated as a teacher and has her first assignment in Tasmania.  She is living in her grandparent's cottage where she spent many happy summers as a child.  But Kate isn't a child anymore.  She has fallen into an affair with one of her student's father, her first experience of sex and it has her blind to the consequences of what may follow.  

Her lover's wife is a novelist and is working on a book about a famous murder case that happened in Tasmania.  In that case, a young girl had an affair with a veterinarian and was found murdered.  Was it her lover's wife who disappeared after the murder?  Or was it her lover who killed both his young love and his wife to start over fresh?  Kate isn't sure but becomes entranced with the case, even to the point of writing her own book about it, in her case a book meant for young children told by animals.

But Kate will soon learn that actions have consequences.  She starts to get threatening notes telling her that her secret is known.  The women she works with and the other parents seem to know what is going on and treat her scornfully.   Soon, she is being stalked at her cottage and her car is being vandalized?  Will Kate survive her affair?

Chloe Hooper's writing has won numerous awards, both in Australia where she was born and worldwide.  This novel was nominated for the Orange Prize, the former name of the Women's Prize for Fiction.  It outlines the rapture of a first sexual affair and the blindness to those around one while caught up in the new experience.  It also outlines the lengths that the scorned wife may attempt to rectify the situation from her viewpoint.  This book is recommended for literary and mystery readers.