Seven years ago in Cape Town three South African schoolboys were abducted in broad daylight on consecutive days. They were never seen again. Now, a new case for the unpredictable Colonel Vaughn de Vries casts a light on the original enquiry for him, a personal failure which has haunted him for those seven years and has cost him his marriage and peace of mind. Struggling in a mire of departmental and racial rivalry, de Vries seeks the whole truth and unravels a complex history of abuse, deception and murder. Challenging friends, colleagues and enemies, de Vries comes to realise he doesn't know who he can trust any more. Set against the richly described background of Cape Town and the endless rolling veld, this chilling thriller reveals layer on layer of abuse - physical, political and psychological. paulmendelson.co.uk

Paul Mendelson has written for the theatre and television and is the author of eleven non-fiction titles concerning mind-sports such as bridge and poker, as well as being a crime novelist whose first novel, The First Rule of Survival, was short-listed for the CWA Golden Dagger Crime Novel of the Year in 2014. His second novel, The Serpentine Road, was long-listed for the same prize in 2015. Both have been translated into several languages and a television adaptation is already in preparation.