Caravan - Cassandra Keen

To his parents - Paul, a classics professor, and interior designer mother Morgana - Lucien was an averagely difficult young man, who turned his back on the adults who did their best for him. To his schoolteacher stepmother, Ruth, he was a disaffected character - and his death in a caravan fire was the culmination of a pattern of disturbed behaviour. Ruth, sole witness to the tragedy, keeps quiet, afraid of association and possible blame, but Lucien, a destructive ghost, becomes a bigger presence in death than he was in life, with his legacy of blame and retribution. Ruth can neither live with this, nor hope for it to change; she can only try to escape the downward spiral that is affecting her family. Escaping for a few days to Malta, Ruth is distracted by a spiritual presence in the neolithic temples and finds herself in an agitated state of reflection. On meeting Frank, a documentary film maker, she questions her part in the tragedy. With new insight, Ruth seems likely to redeem her marriage but during her absence, shared grief has brought back together her husband and his ex-wife Morgana. Morgana is intent on winning back Paul and taking over Ruth's son, Max, in a vendetta... Following the break-up of her marriage, Ruth hopes to find happiness with Frank, but when he visits her home town with its complex family relationships, she realises that this won't be so simple... Caravan is a gripping novel that will take the reader on many twists and turns as it reaches its compelling conclusion.