Germany is newly unified when sixteen-year-old Maya Wiesberg leaves her homeland to spend a year in upstate New York. So reluctant is she to leave her family, she refuses to say a proper goodbye to her beloved grandmother, something she will have cause to regret when her grandmother disappears. Twenty-seven years later, a landslide uncovers Martha Wiesberg’s body on a resort not far from where Maya went to school. Although phobic about flying, Maya decides to travel out to see the spot where her grandmother died. But the Montgomery family who own the resort don’t welcome her enquiries, especially when it turns out Martha was murdered. |
Daniela Tully knows how to spin a tale. This, her debut, encompasses romance, mystery, psychological suspense, family saga, along with a nerve-wracking account of ordinary life under Hitler’s regime. I’m delighted to take a slot on the blog tour. Thanks to Legend Press for my advance proof copy.
The latest flash fiction challenge is for a 99-word story on ice. It’s taken me from Daniela Tully’s gothic hotel in upstate New York to Sweden’s ice hotel, a place I used to think would make a romantic holiday until Mr A reminded me that extreme temperatures make me retch. But I can go there in spirit, along with Maya … |
Grandmother promised we’d visit the ice hotel. When I was old enough to drink vodka from a glass made of ice. But at eighteen I hung out with friends, so Grandmother went alone. And never returned.
Twenty years on, the ice is melting. The sleigh ride to the hotel holds no romance for a lone divorcee. Will I manage to sleep on a block of ice draped with reindeer hides? Will I discover what happened to Gran?
The huskies stop, barking furiously. No sign of the hotel. What’s that? A body, they say, floating beneath the ice.