Close Your Eyes – Amanda Ward

A page-turning, beautifully written novel from the critically-acclaimed author of Forgive Me, How to be Lost and Sleep Toward Heaven.My father smelled like cigarettes and cardamom. When I was small, and wanted comfort, he would put down the wooden spoon when he was cooking, or the pen when he was writing. Always, he would halt what he was doing and crouch down. I pressed my cheek to his warm chest. In his arms, I was safe.The savage murder of eight-year-old Lauren's mother, and the sentencing of her father Izaan to life imprisonment for the murder, tears her world apart. As an adult, she can't understand why she has panic attacks, is unable to accept her boyfriend's marriage proposal, or listen to her brother Alex attempt to convince her of their father's innocence and wrongful imprisonment.Meanwhile, Sylvia Hall is running away from her loser boyfriend, determined to keep the baby he doesn't want. She knows her best friend since childhood, Victoria, will help her – but Victoria has her own problems that threaten to consume her.All three women are connected by tragedy and betrayal: Close Your Eyes is a heart-breaking page-turner about what happens when a family is destroyed.