Blood Sisters

*Longlisted for the 2020 Davitt Awards: Adult Crime*

A young Asian woman lies in a pool of blood in a Cairns motel. Transferred to hospital, she dies before she can tell her story. Detective Cass Diamond and her team are soon on the case. Searching through her possessions, the police begin to ask questions: Was the woman part of a sex-trafficking ring? Who brought her to Cairns? Are other women in danger?  Soon it appears that many women may be missing.  Could their disappearance be linked to the brutal murder of a Cairns sex worker several years earlier?

Meanwhile a group of Cairns schoolgirls have become involved, one of them having witnessed the discovery of the young woman in the motel. Unconnected to the detectives, the girls pursue their own investigations. Will they pry too far?

As these parallel searches progress, the story moves to the tropical rainforest surrounding Cairns, beautiful but capable of hiding many things. What secrets does it hold, who else may be concealed in its depths? The third Cass Diamond mystery explores sex trafficking and abortion, teenage emotions and adult mischief, in a story as densely branched as the rainforest itself. Caroline de Costa holds her readers captive until the very last word.