Welsh artist Sara Jenkins husband and young son are killed during the shooting of a wealthy Italian in London.

A year after the unsolved murders she meets a Canadian academic who helps her find a way out of her darkness. Sara travels alone to Siena to search for a killer and find closure.

Her pain and grief drive her to the edge of madness as her life spins out of control.

new revised and updated edition was republished on April 26th 2021

Siena Excerpt

At Paddington Railway Station, six-year-old Ben Jenkins watched the train as it curved around the track and slowly approached the end of the platform. He had his new camera pressed tightly against his eye. His finger was ready to press the button. His dad had told him that if he was going to take a picture of the train, it was better to wait until it stopped before doing it. If it was moving the photo might be all blurry and he wanted his mum and friends to be able to see it properly. The train was still quite a long way from the big red buffer stops. Ben was tall enough to see them on the other side of the ticket barrier. He thought about the story his dad had told him this morning on the train up from Wales, about Paddington Bear coming from his home a long way away in a country called Peru and being all on his own until a family found him. Ben wished it had been his family. Playing with Paddington would be fun. Ben thought he would have time to look around to see if he was still here before the train stopped and he could take his photo.

There was no sign of a little bear in a blue coat and red hat, but he did see lots of people of all ages, colours, and sizes as he turned his head, still holding the camera in position. Another thing his dad had said was keep still and try not to wobble the camera. When he turned back to the platform the train had stopped and he waited for a moment, making sure he had the front of the engine in the small frame before pressing the button.

Suddenly a dark figure with a gun came out of the crowd and moved quickly towards a middle-aged man standing behind Ben. The man seemed to realise the danger and as the gun was raised, he frantically looked around then grabbed the small boy in front of him. Ben dropped his camera as he was snatched up and held tightly against the man’s body. He struggled and screamed ‘Daddy!’

Ceri Jenkins, only a couple of metres away but in a crush of people looking at the departures board, heard Ben’s frantic cry. He searched for his son and saw him struggling in the man’s arms, roared his name, shoving people out of his way as he hurtled towards him.

The first bullet hit Ben, exited his small body, and punched into the man holding him. The second slammed into the man’s head as Ben fell from his arms, and the third and fourth hit Ceri as he threw himself at the dark figure with the gun. He was dead before he hit the ground. Then as quickly as he had appeared, the angel of death was gone. It had happened so fast that at first only a young man, now catatonic with shock and covered in blood and bits of brain, was aware that something terrible had happened. Soon others saw and the cacophony of panic began.

Why I wanted to write Siena.

I have always been interested in the psychology of emotions and its fragile balance of opposites.The cause and effect of extremes. Love and hate, joy and despair, desperation and hope and the resilience and diversity of the human spirit to face and overcome the seemingly impossible.

In Siena, I wanted to explore, grief and loss as well as love and the need for retribution. Sara, the main character has to face the worst thing that could ever happen, happening, the unthinkable becoming a reality. It is her journey from desolation to hope that is the theme of the book. How she gets there, who helps or hinders along the way is the heart of the story.

Writing a psychogical thriller is a challenge and not the easiest journey. Not only do you have to devise an intricate and devious web of cause and effect but you also have to search for that psychological string of DNA to utilise the research, advice and structure you have gathered to help find the truth of the story. With the breadth of the novel you have time to explore and in my case suggest an initial pathway for your characters and then follow where they lead, perhaps guiding the sliding doors of choice to suit your purpose. Tapping into deep and raw emotions has never been that hard for me. I think that might have been down to my dad’s death when I was thirteen and I had to find a way through it. I chose to open rather than shut off what I felt but even that didn’t displace the anger and agony of instant loss. So, with this experience and all those of the years since, I was able to go where there was little light and experience the reality I wanted to give my unsuspecting characters. Sometimes I was drained and red-eyed after putting myself through the grief, pain and guilt of losing a family (as does Sara in Siena) and often I would live out loudly the words, madness and tears in the feral but safe confines of my writing shed. It was a journey that gave me a better understanding of who I was and why I had made or not made the decisions of life that I had. Looking deeply into a burning soul, albeit one you have created, is a painful privilege that can be an insight into the spirit that gives you strength to find hope and a way to get through, changed and never innocent again, but able to live and not just exist from day to day.