A compulsively readable, character-driven psychological thriller about two determined women who, over the course of three suspenseful weeks, take the law into their own hands to reveal the truth about a shocking crime. Vikki Wakefield’s compelling story is about class, corruption, and big-picture values of love, loyalty and the vindication of truth and justice. And a very brave dog called Blue.
TO THE RIVER
by Vikki Wakefield
Text Publishing (Australia), February 2024
How long can you hide the truth?
The Kelly family has always been trouble. When a fire in a remote caravan community kills nine people, including 17-year-old Sabine Kelly’s mother and sister, Sabine confesses to the murders. Shortly after, she escapes custody and disappears.
Journalist Rachel Weidermann has long suspected Sabine made her way back to the river. Now, twelve years after the ‘Caravan Murders’, and having recently been made redundant from her marriage, motherhood and career, she has the time and the tenacity to corner a fugitive and land the story of the year.
Rachel’s ambition lights the fuse leading to a brutal chain of events, and the web Sabine weaves will force Rachel to question everything she believes. Vikki Wakefield’s compelling psychological thriller is about class, corruption, love, loyalty, and the vindication of truth and justice. And a brave dog called Blue.
Vikki Wakefield writes fiction for adults and young adults. Her novels have been shortlisted for numerous awards. After You Were Gone, a psychological thriller, was her first novel for adults and was published in 2022 to much acclaim. TO THE RIVER is her second psychological thriller for adults. Vikki lives in Adelaide, South Australia.

Book 1: THE ASSASSIN THIEF
Book 2: THE SOUL THIEF
Jane Pool likes her safe, suburban existence just fine. She has a house, a family, (an infuriating mother-in-law,) and a quiet-if-unfulfilling administrative job at the local college. Everything is wonderfully, numbingly normal. Yet Jane remains haunted by her past: her mercurial, absent mother, her parents’ secrets, and the act of violence that transformed her life. When her estranged twin, Lila, makes contact, claiming to know where their mother is and why she left all those years ago, Jane agrees to join her, desperate for answers and the chance to reconnect with the only person who really knew her true self. Yet as the hunt becomes treacherous, and pulls the two women to the earth’s distant corners, they find themselves up against their mother’s subterfuge and the darkness that always stalked their family. Now Jane stands to lose the life she’s made for the one that has been impossible to escape.