The Fiction Writer

Last night I dreamt I went to Malibu again...

Once-rising literary star Olivia Fitzgerald is in a downward spiral. After her second novel, a retelling of Rebecca, fails, her third novel can't find a publisher. And Olivia's boyfriend breaking up with her hasn't helped her creativity much either. Broke, newly single and struggling to write another book, she jumps at the chance for a high-paying ghostwriting job when her agent calls with the opportunity.

It almost seems too good to be true: all she has to do is spend a few weeks in Malibu interviewing Henry 'Ash' Asherwood, a recently widowed billionaire recluse, who wants her to write a book about a stunning family secret involving his grandmother and Daphne du Maurier.

But when she arrives at his Malibu estate, nothing is what it seems. For one thing, Ash is strangely reluctant to truly share his family secrets with Olivia, and she keeps catching him in lies. For another, he seems more interested in her than their writing project. (Though is that really such a bad thing?) And when she discovers a more recent secret, Olivia finds herself caught up in a gothic mystery of her own.

Can she rewrite the past to reveal the deadly truth?