Meredith Griffin manages the emergency department at St Jude Hospital. A specialist in psychiatric nursing, she’s also an expert at hiding her own problems – and solving everyone else’s.
When women with the same fatal injury begin turning up in Meredith’s emergency ward, their deaths are labelled as suicides. But Meredith isn’t so sure. With the help of Detective Leo Donnelly, she begins an investigation to prove that the women were murdered.
As pressure mounts from all quarters to stop her, questions arise about why the women were targeted – and why the hospital is so desperate to cover things up.
In a battle against addiction, self-doubt and a corrupt institution that may be hiding a serial killer, Meredith finds herself in the crosshairs of a network of powerful people – all of whom will stop at nothing to protect their privilege and keep her from the truth.
The Scarlet Cross is an atmospheric and intelligent crime thriller set in a hospital where nothing is as it seems. This accomplished debut from Canadian-Australian author Lyn McFarlane won the 2019 Crime Writers of Canada Award of Excellence for best unpublished manuscript. If you can stomach a creepy hospital setting and some disturbing crimes, then put The Scarlet Cross on your list of new thrillers to read.
The Scarlet Cross takes place in and around a British hospital and follows protagonist Meredith as she balances her own life dramas with increasingly worrisome cases turning up in the emergency department. Meredith’s investigations take her down a dangerous path that will hit close to home and lead deep into the hospital’s connections with the Church. The ritualistic nature of the murders is perhaps the most unsettling part of The Scarlet Cross, a read packed with twists and turns that will have you second-guessing your own predictions as to what will happen throughout.
With The Scarlet Cross, Lyn McFarlane cements herself as a brilliant new voice in crime fiction.
Leave a Reply