'Coldness is something you can nurture. Same as love or warmth. You can cut the strings holding you, not easily, but ruthlessly. Sever the tendons, peel back the fat and heart muscle. Until you are simple and kite-like, twanging on the wind. You never escape entirely, that other you follows like a sloughed-off tail. But life becomes more distant, love stays at arms' length. I've had to do that. Because of Flo.' A daughter has disappeared. Six months ago, twelve-year-old Flo ran away from home and then just disappeared. Her mother Lucy, having retreated to a country town to find a new life, now hears a whisper that sets her again on the long-cold trail. She's never believed that Flo is dead and has her suspicions about who might be responsible for her disappearance. Lucy returns to Sydney - with only her wits, her anger and her fierce determination - to find the truth about her own lies. Brilliantly realised, like Kate Lyons' first novel The Water Underneath, this is a gritty, compelling and honest novel about motherhood, guilt, loss and revenge.