The Devil You Know

October 27, 2014
Set in and around Toronto in 1993, Canadian author de Mariaffi’s artful first novel chronicles the efforts of journalist Evie Jones to track down the man who murdered a friend of hers, 11-year-old Lianne Gagnon, in 1982. Robert Nelson Cameron was identified as a suspect but never caught. Jones researches the killer through old newspaper articles using the nascent Internet, aided by her cautiously flirtatious friend, David Patton. Since Lianne’s death, Evie has suffered from some form of post-traumatic stress; the man she often sees at her apartment window could be real or the product of an overheated imagination. When Evie points out to her mother, Annie, that women read more true crime than men, Annie replies the reason is not entertainment but survival: “It’s so we learn how to get away.” Hooked readers will silently implore Evie to refrain from entering a basement or a cabin in the woods in pursuit of a story—and a killer. Agent: Samantha Haywood, Transatlantic Literary Agency (Canada).