Chris Sharpe

The Ghosts of Gehen Hill Chris Sharpe

The Ghosts of Gehen Hill

"Coincidence rules our lives, fate being the journey, destiny our goal." At least that's what Barry Hoffer would tell you. Hoffer, his daughter Issy and the enigmatic Maggie Stride are the main characters of this intriguing murder mystery, whose lives are repeatedly dogged by a series of puzzling coincidences. The story begins in the year 1885, the victim being Police Constable Jack Pawley. Fast forward to the present day and the primary coincidence is that Barry Hoffer's car, without plausible explanation, breaks down at exactly the same spot that Jack Pawley was brutally murdered. 'You must be connected in some way, ' Maggie Stride says to architect Hoffer, suggesting that it is his destiny to discover exactly how his family might be connected to a tragedy which happened, getting on for a hundred and forty years ago. There is of course a twist in the tale? Poacher, Gideon Moggs is arrested for the murder of P. C Pawley and duly hanged three months later, protesting his innocence to the end. The regular manifestation of ghosts from the past, plus circumstantial evidence, also suggests that perhaps Moggs might not have been P. C. Pawley's murderer. The story continues even though Hoffer and his daughter's attempts to identify the true killer are thwarted, until Maggie Stride is, at last, prepared to give up her own, long-held secret.