The Cliff’s Edge

by Charles Todd Book 13 in the Bess Crawford Mysteries series.

First published 2023

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4.6(2,094)

Uncertain what place remains for her after wartime nursing, Bess Crawford agrees to assist a family friend in Yorkshire. A fatal accident in isolated Scarfdale leaves one man dead, another gravely injured and two neighbouring families confined together while the police conduct an inquest. Bess soon suspects that the apparent accident is connected to a feud whose origins predate the war but whose bitterness has been intensified by loss.

The novel returns to the domestic consequences of demobilization, when women who had gained responsibility during the war faced pressure to surrender it and families struggled to absorb changed survivors. The closed valley setting turns inherited grievance into a social system, forcing Bess to decide which loyalties deserve preservation and which have become lethal.