When I first heard about Heatstroke by Hazel Barkworth I knew it would be just my kind of read and I’m absolutely delighted to be helping reveal the details about it today. My enormous thanks to Jo Liddiard for inviting  me to participate.

Heatstroke will be published by Headline Review on 28th May 2020 and is available for pre-order here.

Heatstroke

The summer burns with secrets…

It is too hot to sleep. To work. To be questioned time and again by the police.

At the beginning of a stifling, sultry summer, everything shifts irrevocably when Lily doesn’t come home one afternoon.

Rachel is Lily’s teacher. Her daughter Mia is Lily’s best friend. The girls are fifteen – almost women, still children.

As Rachel becomes increasingly fixated on Lily’s absence, she finds herself breaking fragile trusts and confronting impossible choices she never thought she’d face.

It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.

Intoxicating and compulsive, Heatstroke is a darkly gripping, thought-provoking novel of crossed boundaries, power and betrayal, that plays with expectations at every turn.

Now doesn’t that sound intense and intriguing? I cannot wait to read Heatstroke. I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy it immensely.

About Hazel Barkworth

Hazel Barkworth is a graduate of both the Oxford University MSt in Creative Writing and the Curtis Brown Creative Novel-Writing Course. She lives in London with her partner, and works as a cultural consultant. Her debut novel Heatstroke will be published by Headline in 2020.

You can find Hazel on Instagram and Twitter @BarkworthHazel.