[4] Following the unexplained death of her sister, Nel, in a pool at the foot of a cliff, Jules Abbott returns to Beckford, a fictional town in Northumberland, to care for her niece, Lena.

Lena believes that her mum jumped into the Drowning Pool, a place where multiple women throughout the town's history have died.

Detective Sergeant Erin Morgan sensed Sean's distress in the case and found out that his mother also committed suicide in the Drowning Pool.

Louise, Katie's mother, was relieved that Nel died as she holds her responsible for inspiring girls to become curious about the Drowning Pool.

Jules searches for her mother's bracelet which Nel wore all the time and is shocked to find that it is missing.

Mark Henderson, Lena's teacher, finds Nel's bracelet in Helen's drawer while searching her room.

She meets Nickie, a con artist who tells her that she must look upon Lauren (Patrick's dead wife) and not Helen.

While acknowledging the challenges of writing for 11 separate narrative voices, crime novelist Val McDermid wrote in The Guardian that the similarity of the characters' tone and register makes it "almost impossible to tell [them] apart, which end up being monotonous and confusing"; furthermore, it doesn't reflect the speech patterns of Northumberland.

[5] Writing in The New York Times, Janet Maslin wrote that Hawkins' "goal may be to build suspense, but all she achieves is confusion.

[8] Jocelyn McClurg for USA Today also offers praise, suggesting "Hawkins, influenced by Hitchcock, has a cinematic eye and an ear for eerie, evocative language.

"[9] In 2017 Ali Qane’ of the Tehran publisher Kuleh Poshty Publications stated that the company he works for received the right to translate the book in Iran after Qane’ requested the author's permission to do so via a telephone call; he stated that five employees of the company are translating different parts of the book.