The Kismet Key

An 80,000-word literary thriller — currently seeking representation

Huddled in the bed of a pickup truck, eight-year-old Grace Thomson watches her neighbor Butch Jager bring a shovel down on a woman’s head. Beside her, her six-year-old brother Gary’s whimper catches in his throat. When Butch dumps the body into a freshly dug grave, his message is clear: tell anyone what you saw, and you’re next.

Twenty-four years later, Grace has built a carefully constructed life as a fourth-grade teacher in Ann Arbor, far from that terrible day. But when her dying father presses a tarnished silver key into her palm and whispers, “Tell no one.” her safe world begins to crack.

The key unlocks a hidden box in her father’s toolshed, containing photographs, a birth certificate for a woman named Ann Marie Turner, and a bus ticket to Chicago—evidence her father had protected for decades. Before Grace can investigate, Butch resurfaces as a janitor at her elementary school. Break-ins at her home, threatening messages in her classroom, and increasingly dangerous encounters follow. Butch knows her father had evidence linking him to the murder, and he’s desperate to destroy it.

As Grace digs deeper into Ann Marie’s past, she uncovers a devastating truth: the elegant woman she watched die twenty-four years ago was her biological mother.

Comparable Titles

For fans of Chelsea Bieker’s Madwoman, Ana Reyes’ The House in the Pines, and Nicole Trope’s The Family Across the Street.‍ ‍

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Currently querying literary agents. Want updates on the journey to publication? Subscribe below.