Epilogue
SIX DEAD IN BOAT PARTY TRAGEDY OFF CONDEMNED ISLAND
The Cornwall Coastguard has reported six dead after a party boat sunk off the island of Nirrik, on the Cornish coast.
Nirrik has been uninhabited and certified condemned since 1895, when the last settlers were evacuated. The island was removed from council jurisdiction and purchased by the Timeo Corporation, a technology company headquartered in St Helier, Jersey. No information about the CEO of Timeo or their links to the tragedy has been uncovered at this time.
The dead have been identified as Theresa ‘Tiggy’ Ramona (25), an Instagram influencer from Chelsea; her partner, Giles Horner (28), a games designer from Essex; celebrity gossip columnist Lucy De Marco (38); James Devlin (31), a photographer; Brenda Carter (62), a venture capitalist; and Scott Williams (35), a nutraceuticals executive from Los Angeles. While it is not yet known why they were gathered on the island, an anonymous source, who alerted the coastguard, has suggested that a private party was underway.
The island’s only building, a large, stone dwelling, has been burnt down, but it is not yet clear if the events are connected. Investigators have yet to access the island, as it is not known what type of contamination led to the island being abandoned many years ago.
Timeo has owned the island since 2010, according to the registrar general’s office and the land registry, but it is still classified as uninhabitable amid concerns of a leaked biological agent.
The island was previously recorded under the name Father’s Island, and local sources report stories of shipwrecks, drownings, extremist religious practices, child abuse, incest and more – although this is anecdotal and not officially recorded in either the parish notes or the council archives.
The families of the deceased have been informed.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A few years ago, in an in-flight magazine, I read about the Swedish company Biohax International. Set up by a former body piercer, the company makes microchips that are inserted into the user’s hand, just above their thumb. These chips are just like the ones used in any contactless technology – and they can be used for all the same purposes, such as paying for things, information transfer and replacing keys. I was fascinated by this, and the fact that the users are more than happy to be almost ‘experimented’ on, with an actual device under their skin. Being a crime writer, I immediately thought about how this could be exploited for nefarious means – hence the tracking device I invented for this book.
Next, I decided that I wanted to write something set on an uninhabited island. I was inspired by some of the tiny islands along the East Lothian coastline (where I grew up) and also by the Scilly Isles off the Cornish coast, which I visited to do research. It almost became a very different kind of book, when the Scillonian ferry broke down, leaving us stranded there for a few days longer than planned! Anyway, when I pitched this idea to Jack Butler at Thomas & Mercer, he was immediately intrigued and instantly came up with ‘The Digital Age meets the Golden Age’ – which sums the book up perfectly!
So the first thank you goes to my editor, Jack. Thank you for believing in me and my ideas, and for helping me shape the plot in its early stages into something that ended up being very fun to write. Thank you to my developmental editor, David, for making me pull it apart and dig deep into the darkest corners of my mind to make the book even better. And thank you to the copyediting, proofreading and production teams for whipping it into shape and polishing every last detail.
Huge thanks, as always, to my agent Phil Patterson, and all at Marjacq, for making this happen.
Thank you to my ever-present encouragement crew: Steph, Ed, Vicki, Lisa, Kat, Jenny and Amanda; and to my very good friend Colin Scott – who knows more than anyone else, about most things.
Big thanks, as always, to you – and if this is the first book of mine you’ve read, then I hope you’ll read more! And to my faithful fans, who’ve been with me right from the start – thank you!
Without readers (and listeners!), bloggers and booksellers, there would be very little for me to do, except write for myself – so thank you all from the bottom of my heart, for letting me tell my stories to as many people as I can.
To my family and friends – thank you for always supporting me, for buying all my books, coming to my launches and being so proud of me, even when I struggle to make enough time to see you.
And finally, to JLOH, my travel companion, tea and toast maker, and the one who has to deal with me when writer’s block turns me into a demon . . . you are the very best.
If you want to find out more about me, you can go to my website: www.susiholliday.com, or have a look here: linktr.ee/susiholliday for my social media links. I’d love to hear from you!
And of course, if you enjoyed my book, I would really appreciate it if you could leave a review . . .
Love, Susi
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Susi Holliday grew up in East Lothian, Scotland. A life-long fan of crime and horror, her short stories have been published in various places, and she was shortlisted for the inaugural CWA Margery Allingham Prize. She is the author of seven novels, five of them written as SJI Holliday. You can find out more at her website, www.sjiholliday.com, on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SJIHolliday/ and on Twitter @SJIHolliday. She also provides coaching for new crime writers via www.crimefictioncoach.com.