Lacey Elliot has been a woman without a past since the day her mother whisked her off to Charlottesville, refusing for thirty years to speak of her father, her family, or her history. But when Lacey intercepts a desperate letter from an aunt in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, she sees her chance to confront the past that has terrified her mother and to fill in the gaps in her own life.
Against the charm and the colorful, turbulent history of the picturesque town, the violent history of Lacey's own heritage is about to repeat itself. As she finds herself drawn to a man intrigued by the town for reasons of his own, old ghosts reappear and danger returns, as a killer walks among them once more.
"Whitney lives up to her reputation with this contemporary romance steeped in American history."-Booklist
Successful author Molly Hunt, the adopted daughter of Long Island parents, is stunned when a handsome man she meets in her publisher's office makes a startling declaration: that he is about to marry her twin sister. Molly soon discovers that she is actually the long-lost child of the wealthy Mountfort family of Charleston, South Carolina. Eager to solve the puzzle of her birth, Molly begins a fateful journey south.
At the historic family plantation, she meets her beautiful twin, Amelia, their reclusive mother, and a cast of intriguing yet disturbing characters who both question her identity and, in their way, confirm it. Nevertheless, her arrival has set in motion a series of strange and frightening events, and in the intoxicating, magnolia-scented world of Molly's original family, haunting memories of an unsolved murder threaten the family's very existence-as well as her own.
"One of the smoothest suspense novels yet from the prolific Whitney."-Publishers Weekly
Hallie Knight is summoned to a historic seaport town by Nicholas Trench, the critically ill grandfather of her former college roommate. Months earlier, Trench''s granddaughter Susan mysteriously disappeared from his home and all attempts to learn her fate have failed. He feels that if anyone can find Susan, it will be this woman who was his granddaughter''s closest friend.
If Hallie is to succeed, though, it won''t be with the help of the suspicious relatives who surround the old man. With Susan out of the picture, who among them stands to inherit Trench''s money? And why does Hallie suddenly feel so vulnerable in this outwardly peaceful seaside town?
Twenty-five years ago, Susan Prentice lost her mother to a tragic accident. Now she is returning home for the first time to Virginia's eastern shores and the ancestral house whose front steps her mother fell down to her death.
Though Susan has little memory of the accident, her arrival has alarmed those who fear what may lie dormant in Susan's memory. But it is her maternal grandmother, Alex Montoro, a proud, intense, aging doyenne of the ballet, who believes that that memory must be unlocked. For Susan is the only living witness to the tragedy-and Alex suspects that her daughter's fall was no accident.
"One of her best efforts, this carefully crafted novel of psychological suspense by the prolific Whitney, a Mystery Writers of America Grand Master, entices the reader into a series of enigmas."-Publishers Weekly
The lush, secluded mountains of North Carolina's Lake Lure had drawn Lauren Castle into their spell. It was here, in 1938, that Hollywood's most beloved glamour girl, Victoria Frazer, drowned during a scandalous affair with actor Roger Brandt. Few knew about the baby spirited away into the night. That baby was Lauren's mother.
It has been two years since Lauren's filmmaker husband died mysteriously at Lake Lure while making a documentary on Roger Brandt. Now Lauren has received a warning that her husband was murdered. What deadly secret had he uncovered in this scenic idyll? To find her answers, Lauren must face her own past as well as her grandmother's, and delve into the dark truths of a place shrouded in terrifying secrets....
For several years, time and circumstance have managed to separate Hallie Knight and her old friend Susan Trench. But when Susan disappears from her grandfather's seaside home on historic Topsail Island, it is Hallie whom Nicholas Trench calls for help. Wealthy, ill, and irascible, he refuses to believe that his beloved granddaughter and the heir to his fortune has been lost to him. He is certain that if anyone can find Susan, it will be her closest friend, the woman who knows her better than anyone else. When Hallie arrives from California, she find the old man surrounded by an odd collection of friends and relatives, all of whom seem to know a little more than they're willing to tell about Susan Trench and her last days on Topsail. As the threads intertwine, Hallie must confront painful questions that build toward what may be a fearful answer.
"This unabridged presentation of a fine mystery will delight any who want to appreciate Whitney unexpurgated....[An] intriguing story which comes alive under Anna Fields' reading." -Reviewer's Bookwatch
Hollis Sands has never gotten over her husband's death. Ricky had been a famous popular singer, and she wrote her best songs for him. Hollis can't believe he took his own life. Perhaps it was something else...murder.
Finally, at Windtop in Cold Spring Harbor, Hollis finds sanctuary, and begins to put in place the pieces of her life. But strange and frightening things keep happening. Voices sing the song "Rainsong" that she wrote for Ricky. Guitars play from nowhere. Instead of a sanctuary, Windtop has become a trap.
Hollis Sands is no coward. No matter what happens, she is determined to search out the truth. But she does not know how close to death she is.
"A contemporary chiller romance....Whitney drums up suspense at a delightfully frantic pace. Old fans-and new ones-can dig in with total confidence."-Kirkus Reviews
Recover from the death of her son and the end of her marriage, Kelsey Stewart goes to stay with her aunt at her seaside inn in Carmel, California, looking only for retreat. But a local emergency unexpectedly brings Kelsey's troubled heart back to life again.
When a young boy falls from one of the sea cliffs, Kelsey, a therapist specializing in brain-damaged children, is recruited to help rehabilitated Jody. Kelsey finds herself developing feelings for the boy as well as his mysterious father. But as her involvement with Jody and his family deepens, an astonishing mystery unfolds, leading Kelsey to suspect that the boy's anguished condition is not solely due to his accident. It is a mystery that hints at the occult, a mystery of dangerous evil that could ultimately free Kelsey to love with all her heart'or else destroy her forever.
Jennifer still vividly remembers the day when, momentarily distracted, she left her three-year-old daughter, Debbie, unattended in a grocery cart. When she turned back, the child had vanished. For seven years, there had been no sign of Debbie. Then one day, Jennifer receives a mysterious phone call from the wealthy Corinthia Arles, claiming that she has found her daughter.
But when Jennifer arrives at Mrs. Arles' luxurious estate on Vancouver Island, the mystery of her lost daughter only deepens. The sullen girl called Alice bears little resemblance to Debbie, and others claim that Alice is Mrs. Arles' great-grandchild and heir. Caught up in a maze of family intrigues and buried secrets, Jennifer faces a looming threat in her determination to uncover the truth about Debbie.
Christy Loren has come to fear her gift of clairvoyance, an unwanted legacy from her mother, a famous psychic. Without warning, visions envelop her-visions that have guided the police, too late, to the bodies of murder victims. To escape these horrors, Christy flees her home in Long Island to seek peace and safety in the foothills of Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains and the reassuring presence of her down-to-earth aunt.
But she finds that threatening mysteries await her in those mountains-mysteries that surround a writer's recent death and the disappearance of the unearthly, enigmatic Deirdre. Christy senses secrets locked in the heart of Deirdre's tormented husband, with whom she fears she is becoming too emotionally involved-and haunting Deirdre's troubled son.
Caught in this ominous web, Christy must come to terms with her unwanted psychic powers. As she is drawn into the search for Deirdre, she sees with increasing clarity that the mysteries have a connection to a blood-chilling dream that haunts her. In trying to escape her fate, she has unwittingly embraced it. Now, to uncover the truth, Christy must confront her gift of precognition and her dream. The shocking truth will bring her face-to-face with real and terrifying danger. "Like many of Whitney's thirty-two previous novels, this romantic mystery features smooth plotting, skillful foreshadowing, and a determined, inquisitive young heroine in danger."-Publishers Weekly
Despite her misgivings, child psychologist Lynn McLeod can’t ignore the plea to help ten-year-old Jilly Asche, the daughter of her ex-husband, Stephen. But immediately upon her return to Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains, Lynn is drawn subtly into the lives of everyone in the secluded household: Stephen, now an enigmatic stranger; Julian, a mesmerizing family friend who challenges Lynn’s ideas of life and death; and Jilly, the beautiful lost child burdened by a terrifying and deadly secret. The danger that threatens both Stephen and his daughter soon closes tightly around Lynn. And all the while, the soft, hypnotic sound in the wind—the eerie yet beautiful music of the Singing Stones—lures Lynn into a realm of mystery, murder, and dormant passion … and perhaps to the key to her own destiny.
“More rock-solid, reliable Whitney, so just sing along.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
