Tidal Secrets

by Percy Rose

Just as she thinks she can settle into the quite life beside the ocean in tropical North Queensland, Xelma, our psychic sleuth, is thrown into an investigation when her pet, 'Donkey', alerts her to the fearful thing brought in on the high tide. A disembodied arm, found on her doorstep, or at least on her beach embroils her in investigating who it is. Charlie the ghost of her recently murdered stwin sister regularly visits to help her sort out what she must do and provide pithy comment on her progress. Detective Inspector Ryan Croft is sent up from Townsville to investigate, and he and Xelma's friendship continues. The local policeman, who is an ex-collegue from Brisbane of Croft's, finds Xelma's psychic abilities, at best ridiculous, at best suspect. Together, they are all thrown into the private lives of the small seaside Community of Beaufort's Landing and the surrounding Rollingstone area. Drugs, adultery, wife-bashing, sly-grog running, and deadly intents, simmer below the surface until the blustering of a Cyclone blows away the web of lies and deceit. There are many people with secrets lurking below their apparently calm exteriors. Was it an accident? Who is guilty of what? Who is capable of murder? Who attacks Xelma, and can she escape?

196 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 20, 2021