Two women tell the story of the shocking act of violence that transforms both their lives.

Carol and Amy haven't seen each other for decades - not since they met one fateful summer in 1962 - but the death of a very old woman named Hattie reignites long smouldering emotions. What exactly happened to turn a summer idyll into a nightmare?

The first voice we hear in A Study in Red is Amy, talking as if she were the main character in a film noir. Then Carol picks up the narrative like a detective determined to use reason to examine the past. But the past beguiles her and she sinks into her memories of being thirteen, when she was Hattie's guest at her summer place and the enigmatic romance writer held her in thrall.

Amy and Carol think they can understand the violence that took place beside Hattie's swimming pool, but they both get crucial details wrong, and because of that, the mystery and their attempts to solve it have repercussions neither could have foreseen.

A literary mystery and an exploration of the nature of memory, this novel is also a study of the red emotions: lust, anger, jealousy, and not least, love.