The Cry of the Lake

A murder. A mermaid. A memory buried deep beneath the surface.

When six-year-old Cassie sneaks out to catch a mermaid, she finds something far more terrifying—a dead body by the lake. In the chaos that follows, Cassie and her older sister Emily vanish into hiding, leaving a shattered family and a secret no one dares speak aloud.

Years later, Cassie—now known as Lily—is mute, haunted by nightmares of weeping water spirits and forgotten violence. Emily, renamed Grace, is trying desperately to give them both a new life. But when a girl’s body is found by the lake and an innocent man is accused, the past resurfaces with chilling force.

Flo, the accused man’s daughter, is determined to uncover the truth. But in a world of lies, manipulations, and warped love, nothing is as it seems. As the stories of two broken girls collide, a buried skeleton is unearthed—and with it, a reckoning, decades in the making.

A dark and disturbing tale of fractured identities, inherited trauma and the devastating cost of silence—The Cry of the Lake will grip fans of Erin Kelly, Louise Jensen and Ruth Ware.