A Chief Inspector Wexford Mystery.
On the day Lizzie came back from the dead, the police and her family and neighbour had already begun to search for her body. She had been missing for three days.
A short while later, another young woman disappears, just as a convicted paedophile is released back into the community. The residents of the Muriel Campden Estate are up in arms, and even prepared to take the law into their own hands.
Chief Inspector Wexford is not only concerned very personally with the effects of violence and prejudice, but is involved with a new programme called Hurt-Watch, to help the victims of domestic violence. His daughter, Sylvia, the social worker, and never his favourite, has come to work nearby in a refuge for battered women, called The Hide. Her marriage is also in difficulties, although her husband has never raised a hand to her. They are merely incompatible.
Other women in Kingsmarkham are not so lucky, and, after those early disappearances, two far more serious crimes are committed which will affect the lives and attitudes of police and public alike.