TRIGGER WARNING: grooming
Tate Kinsella is accused of murder. A woman fell from the roof of her employer’s building. Initially she thinks it is the mysterious Helen who she met at the Christmas party but the body is identified as that of Maddy. Her boss’s wife… Her boss who she was having an affair with…
The Woman on the Ledge is a psychological thriller about a mysterious death in London. Wow, I loved this book!
Tate meets Helen on the ledge of the building where she works. She manages to talk her down and the next day Helen asks to be readmitted into the building. Shortly after this a body is discovered on the ground and Tate becomes the main suspect when murder is proved. The book shows us Tate in the present day as she explains to her lawyer the truth, while also showing us episodes from the past in the lead up to Maddy’s death.
Tate is a very unreliable narrator. She frequently lies to us, to the police, to her lawyer. This allows for plenty of plot twists as we discover new truths that make us reassess our knowledge of events. Whenever I thought I had the whole picture, BAM! another lie would be revealed and my whole understanding of the plot and characters would change. The misdirection is so skillfully done and the plot is gripping.
The Woman on the Ledge was a fabulous book and I was absolutely gripped by the concept and how it was accomplished on the pages.
Tate Kinsella is a single, out of work actor working as a temp at a London bank when the police arrest her for murder.
A woman falls to her death from the bank’s twenty-fifth floor roof terrace. Tate confesses to having been alone with the victim moments before she died, but insists she had nothing to do with the tragedy, telling her lawyer she’s been framed. Her lawyer, Sarah Kellerman, agrees to help Tate prove her innocence. But it soon becomes clear Tate knows a lot more than she is letting on. Whose secrets is she keeping? And why? As the mystery unfolds it becomes apparent that the key to the truth lies in the past, and nothing about the woman on the ledge is as straightforward as it first appears…
About the Author
Ruth Mancini was born in south-west London, and has worked as a lawyer for the past twenty-five years in and out of courts and police stations, representing those accused of crimes. She has worked as police station’s ‘duty solicitor’ – aka the person you ask for when you are first arrested.
Ruth still practises as a lawyer for a large criminal law firm with offices in London, conducting advocacy in the courts and defending people arrested at the police station. She also reviews trial files across the firm and juggles her legal work with writing crime and psychological fiction. She can be found on Twitter @RuthMancini1 and Facebook at www.facebook.com/ruth.mancini.author