How to Seal Your Own Fate: A Novel

Fans of whodunnits will rejoice! Kristen Perrin is back with her second novel in her Castle Knoll series, a book that begins when local fortune teller and lifelong troublemaker Peony Lane is found dead in the country estate Annie Adams inherited from her Great Aunt Frances. Annie is thrown into a new web of murder spanning decades in the quaint English Village of Castle Knoll that she'll have to solve with her Great Aunt's diaries and files, or else risk losing everything she loves about her new life.

Present day: Annie Adams is just settling into her new countryside life in Castle Knoll when local fortune teller Peony Lane shows up on her doorstep warning Annie about something dark in her future. Before Annie can get answers, however, Peony Lane is found dead inside Gravesdown Estate, the sprawling manor she inherited from her late Aunt Frances. Putting to use Frances's careful records of a lifetime of investigating the inhabitants of her charming village, Annie has no choice but to solve the crime, and unravel the defining mystery of her new home that implicates a whole cast of Castle Knoll characters, including the new police chief and even the Gravesdown Estate gardener, Archie Foyle.

1967: A year has passed since her friend Emily disappeared, and she finds herself caught between two men. Ford Gravesdown is the new head of a local family known for their wealth and, let's say "misuse" of power. Archie Foyle is a local boy who works at the Gravesdown Estate. But Frances, tipped off that something is awry, starts investigating the year-old car crash that claimed the lives of Ford's father, brother, and sister-in-law, and it quickly becomes clear that there was a cover-up of foul play. The question is, just how far does the blackness creep through the heart of Castle Knoll? Frances Adams is as convinced as ever that a murderer is coming for her. When she uncovers secrets kept by both Ford and Archie, she starts to wonder: exactly how much danger is she in?

Story Locale:Castle Knoll, England

Series Overview: In the Castle Knoll Files, Annie investigates more cases “with” Frances. With each book, Frances’s writings and investigations will alternate with Annie’s present-day timeline, and in this way Frances's investigations will help Annie solve new and cold cases in Castle Knoll.

About the Author

Kristen Perrin is originally from Seattle, Washington, where she spent several years working as a bookseller before moving to the UK to do a Masters and PhD. She lives with her family in Surrey, where she can be found poking around vintage bookstores, stomping in the mud with her two kids, and collecting too many plants. Her middle grade movel Attie and the World Breakers was published in German, Dutch, and Polish. How to Solve Your Own Murder was her adult debut.

Author Residence: Surrey, UK

Author Hometown: Seattle, Washington