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When We Were Silent

Additional information

Author

Fiona McPhillips

Genre

Adult – Thriller

Release Date

May 2, 2024

Publisher

Flatiron, Transworld

Categories , Tag Product ID: 19680

Description

An outsider threatens to expose the secrets at an elite private school in this suspenseful debut novel for readers of My Dark Vanessa and Dare Me

Louise Manson is the newest student at Highfield Manor, Dublin’s most exclusive private school. It seems nearly perfect: the high arched window alcoves and tall granite pillars, the overspill of lilac at the front gate and the immaculate playing fields, the giggling students, the dusty, oak-lined library, and the dark, festering secret she has come to expose.

At first, Lou’s working-class status makes her the consummate outsider, though all that changes when she is befriended by the beautiful and wealthy Shauna Power. But Lou finds out that even Shauna is caught up in Highfield’s web, and her time there ends with a lifeless body sprawled at her feet.

Thirty years later, Lou has rebuilt her life after the harrowing events of the so-called “Highfield Affair,” when she gets a shocking phone call. Ronan Power, Shauna’s brother, is a high-profile lawyer bringing a lawsuit against the school. And he needs Lou to testify.

Now with a daughter and career to protect, the last thing Lou wants is for Highfield Manor to be back in her life. But to finally free herself and others, she has to confront her past, go to battle once more, and discover, for once and for all, what really happened at Highfield. Powerful and compelling, When We Were Silent is an unputdownable, thrilling story of exploitation, privilege, and retribution.

About the Author

Photograph of author Fiona McPhillips

Fiona McPhillips is a journalistauthor and screenwriter. Her debut novel, When We Were Silent, which was runner-up for the 2021 CWA Debut Dagger Award, was pre-empted by Transworld (Penguin) in the UK and Flatiron (Macmillan) in the US and will be published in May 2024.

Her prose has been published in The Manchester Review, Barren, Litro and elsewhere and her poetry has appeared in Atrium, Headstuff and The Galway Review. Her screenplay Windmills was a finalist at the 2020 New Renaissance Film Festival in London and the Waterford Film Festival. She is the recipient of a 2021 Arts Council literature bursary.

Fiona started her writing life in music, then jumped to sport. With children came a freelance career, and she wrote features for The Irish Times, The Irish Independent, The Herald, The Huffington post and other publications. She’d always talked about writing a novel… one day. In 2019, it was time to piss or get off the pot and she did an MA in Creative Writing at DCU, graduating with first class honours.

She is a reader for the wonderful Forge literary magazine.

Fiona is represented by Rachel Neely at Mushens Entertainment.

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