Raven Rock

Searching for the mother who had abandoned her as an infant, Henrietta Meredith is drawn to Raven Rock, a small town in the mountains of North Carolina, and to the long-neglected Honeysuckle House where her mother once lived. Why did terrified Maggie Grey leave her baby with the kindly middle-aged Merediths promising to return, only to disappear forever? And what is the link between the faded snapshot of a group of young women and the dark period in the town's past? In her efforts to uncover the truth, Henrietta awakens a dormant evil, endangering her own life and the lives of those around her, the friendly people who had made a place for her in the community. Can one of them be hiding a dreadful secret? Here is the engrossing story of a young woman whose quest leads her down a dangerous, twisting path to a confrontation with unthinkable evil.

From Publishers Weekly

On a quest to find the mother who abandoned her in infancy, young Henrietta Meredith arrives in the small town of Raven Rock, N.C. Settling down in a ramshackle, sinister old house, Henrietta stumbles upon a decades-old crime that is somehow linked with her mother's disappearance. More than 20 years earlier, several young women were killed by a maniac branded The Chuckler. A man was caught and convicted of the murders, but now Henrietta finds herself being stalked by someone using The Chuckler's trademark. As Henrietta slowly warms toward the townspeople who once knew her mother, horrifying suspicions begin to assail her: Is The Chuckler still at large? Did he murder her motherand is she next? This first novel is uneven in spots but tells its tale credibly. Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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"A familiar sense of warning, like a hand on my shoulder, came and went so quickly I thought I must have imagined it. But I knew I hadn't; it had happened too many times before. I would have to be careful here

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