A young Asian woman lies in a pool of blood in a Cairns motel.
Transferred to hospital, she dies before she can tell her story. Detective Cass Diamond and her team are soon on the case. Searching through her possessions, the police begin to ask questions: Was the woman part of a sex-trafficking ring? Who brought her to Cairns? Are other women in danger? Soon it appears that many women may be missing. Could their disappearance be linked to the brutal murder of a Cairns sex worker several years earlier?
Meanwhile a group of Cairns schoolgirls have become involved, one of them having witnessed the discovery of the young woman in the motel. Unconnected to the detectives, the girls pursue their own investigations. Will they pry too far?
As these parallel searches progress, the story moves to the tropical rainforest surrounding Cairns, beautiful but capable of hiding many things. What secrets does it hold, who else may be concealed in its depths?
The third Cass Diamond mystery explores sex trafficking and abortion, teenage emotions and adult mischief, in a story as densely branched as the rainforest itself. Caroline de Costa holds her readers captive until the very last word.
About The Author
De Costa was born in Sydney, Australia, where she began studying medicine in 1963 at the University of Sydney, before dropping out to travel after one year. She re-commenced her undergraduate medical studies in Dublin, at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, in 1967. In 1973 she moved to Papua New Guinea to complete a residency in Port Moresby General Hospital, after which she returned to Ireland to undertake specialist training in obstetrics and gynaecology.
In 1994, she moved to Cairns where she continued her clinical practice until 2013. From 1994 and 2009 de Costa was part of the outreach specialist obstetric and gynaecological service established by Professor Michael Humphrey through Cairns Base Hospital, providing services throughout Far North Queensland.
De Costa is the author of around 90 research articles,and a number of textbooks. Her principal areas of research have been in reduction of foetal alcohol syndrome in children of indigenous women, vitamin D levels requirements of pregnant women in Far North Queensland, as well as birth by caesarean section. She completed a PhD at the University of Sydney under the supervision of Dr Hans Pol researching the history of caesarean section births. Her thesis became the subject of a book, Hail Caesar: Why one in three Australian babies are born by Caesarean sections, published in 2008.
