Already Gone is a prequel novella for Already Dead, by Australian journalist and author, Jaye Ford. Two months after investigative reporter Nick Westing was killed by a hit-and-run driver, his widow, Miranda Jack is haunted by the circumstances: Nick was in his running gear in a suburb forty minutes from home, having left no clue as to why he was there.

Now Miranda haunts the street and the suburb where he was killed, door-knocking, talking to everyone she can in the hope someone will have seen something, know something, that will help her understand.

Eighty-five-year-old Irene Newton didn’t see the hit, only the aftermath, but her empathy is genuine: she, too, has lost someone and still doesn’t know why. Lucy Newton died in very different circumstances, at eleven years old, during or after a routine tonsillectomy. No-one could (or would) tell her why.

Frustrated with her lack of progress in learning about Nick’s murder, Jax turns to something she believes she can solve. But Irene’s daughter died forty years earlier, meaning that many who might have known why are dead or demented. Jax is tenacious, but her enquiries are clearly causing ripples: she is warned off by three different people. The idea of four decades of not knowing spurs her on…

Ford writes characters with depth and a wholly credible plot: readers who enjoyed the earlier-published Already Dead will lap up this extra dose of that book’s gutsy protagonist. Gripping Aussie crime fiction.
This unbiased review is from a copy provided by the author.