1 of 1 copy available
“My book of the year so far . . . breathtakingly, heart-stoppingly brilliant.”—Sophie Hannah, New York Times bestselling author of The Monogram Murders
I am the star of screaming headlines and campfire ghost stories. I am one of the four Black-Eyed Susans. The lucky one.
As a sixteen-year-old, Tessa Cartwright was found in a Texas field, barely alive amid a scattering of bones, with only fragments of memory as to how she got there. Ever since, the press has pursued her as the lone surviving “Black-Eyed Susan,” the nickname given to the murder victims because of the yellow carpet of wildflowers that flourished above their shared grave. Tessa’s testimony about those tragic hours put a man on death row.
Now, almost two decades later, Tessa is an artist and single mother. In the desolate cold of February, she is shocked to discover a freshly planted patch of black-eyed susans—a summertime bloom—just outside her bedroom window. Terrified at the implications—that she sent the wrong man to prison and the real killer remains at large—Tessa turns to the lawyers working to exonerate the man awaiting execution. But the flowers alone are not proof enough, and the forensic investigation of the still-unidentified bones is progressing too slowly. An innocent life hangs in the balance. The legal team appeals to Tessa to undergo hypnosis to retrieve lost memories—and to share the drawings she produced as part of an experimental therapy shortly after her rescue.
What they don’t know is that Tessa and the scared, fragile girl she was have built a fortress of secrets. As the clock ticks toward the execution, Tessa fears for her sanity, but even more for the safety of her teenaged daughter. Is a serial killer still roaming free, taunting Tessa with a trail of clues? She has no choice but to confront old ghosts and lingering nightmares to finally discover what really happened that night.
Shocking, intense, and utterly original, Black-Eyed Susans is a dazzling psychological thriller, seamlessly weaving past and present in a searing tale of a young woman whose harrowing memories remain in a field of flowers—as a killer makes a chilling return to his garden.
This ebook edition contains a special preview of Julia Heaberlin’s Paper Ghosts.
Praise for Black-Eyed Susans
“A masterful thriller that shouldn’t be missed . . . brilliantly conceived, beautifully executed . . . [Julia] Heaberlin’s work calls to mind that of Gillian Flynn. Both writers published impressive early novels that were largely overlooked, and then one that couldn’t be: Flynn’s Gone Girl and now Heaberlin’s Black-Eyed Susans. Don’t miss it.”—The Washington Post
“[A] gem of a novel . . . richly textured, beautifully written . . . Tension builds, and the plot twists feel earned as well as genuinely surprising.”—The Boston Globe
“A tense, slow-burning, beautifully written novel of survival and hope. Highly recommended.”—William Landay, New York Times bestselling author of Defending Jacob
“Deliciously twisty and eerie, Heaberlin’s third psychological suspense novel is intricately layered and instantly compelling.”—Library Journal (starred...
-
Creators
-
Publisher
-
Release date
August 11, 2015 -
Formats
-
Kindle Book
-
OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9780804178006
- File size: 3349 KB
-
EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9780804178006
- File size: 3862 KB
-
-
Languages
- English
-
Reviews
-
May 11, 2015
This gripping psychological thriller from Heaberlin (Lie Still) alternates between the present and 1995, when 16-year-old Tessie Cartwright went missing and was subsequently found in a Texas wheat field covered by black-eyed Susans, barely alive, on top of three female corpses, two long dead and one only about a day old. Though the traumatized Tessie can recall only flashes of the incident, she testifies in the trial against accused serial killer Terrell Darcy Goodwin; Terrell is sentenced to death but is still alive on death row years later when someone plants black-eyed Susans in Tessie’s yard, a possible taunt from the real perpetrator. Still lacking recall, Tessie nevertheless agrees to help a group that fights to get death row convictions stayed or overturned. Aided by Terrell’s defense attorney and a DNA expert, she races to find evidence sufficient to prevent Terrell’s execution and to discover what really happened. The suspense builds as Tessie uncovers devastating secrets from the past en route to the shocking ending. Agent: Pam Ahearn, Ahearn Agency. -
May 15, 2015
As the only survivor of a serial killer, Tessa Cartwright has spent the last 20 years trying to forget her past, but when the killer's execution date looms, she begins questioning everything she once believed. The media dubbed 16-year-old Tessa and the other Texas victims "Black-Eyed Susans" because of the flowers that covered the ground where they were found. Heaberlin (Playing Dead, 2012, etc.) wisely metes out the gory details of the 15 hours between when Tessa went missing and when she was discovered in a grave along with the freshly rotting corpse of one still-unidentified "Susan" and the bones of two others slowly over the course of the narrative, which shifts back and forth between past and present. Tessa's childhood best friend, Lydia, stands by her side throughout the trial until an alleged betrayal tears the friendship apart. Now the mother of a 14-year-old girl, Charlie, Tessa is convinced by a crusading anti-death penalty lawyer and an eminent forensic scientist to help secure a new trial for Terrell Darcy Goodwin, the man on death row for kidnapping her and murdering the other girls. Shaky eyewitness testimony and junk science convicted Goodwin back in 1994-Tessa had no memory of her attacker-and she's wracked by guilt that her testimony may have sent an innocent man to prison. Heaberlin takes what could have been the ingredients for just another episode of CSI and turns them into a truly compelling tale of the fragility of memory and elusive redemption.COPYRIGHT(2015) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
-