‘Genre-bending, genius . . . A superb, intoxicating book’
Telegraph
‘Deliciously twisty. I raced through it in one evening’
The Times
‘A proper read-it-in-one-go book, opening up an advent calendar of lives behind the doors of a block of flats’
Adam Kay, author of This is Going to Hurt
Margate is in the grip of a heatwave when David Whitehouse stumbles across the mysterious story of a local woman who lived on the ground floor of Saltwater Mansions, a block of flats not far from the sea. On paper, Caroline Lane was unremarkable. She paid her mortgage every month. She always paid her bills. But nobody had seen or heard from her for 13 years, and no one had ever come looking. She had disappeared completely.
David quickly becomes as fascinated by this missing woman as the residents of Saltwater Mansions, all of whom have their own theories to share, and their own unique stories to tell. As his obsession grows, David unearths vital clues that private detectives and amateur investigators alike have failed to spot. But the closer he gets to the truth, the clearer it becomes that this mystery was never meant to be solved, and that some stories don’t want to be told. What if this one was never about Caroline Lane at all?
From acclaimed and award-winning author David Whitehouse, Saltwater Mansions is an astonishing work of creative non-fiction blending reportage and memoir to explore the extraordinary hidden lives of ordinary people, the impact of grief, and the dangerous allure of taking true crime stories into our own hands.
‘I inhaled it in a sitting – what an exhilarating book. Brave, revealing and unexpected’
Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of Love
‘A tremendous chronicler of real stories . . . an utterly absorbing read’
i Paper
‘Ordinary lives, family grief, true crime, the dangers of amateur sleuthing, unexpected stories . . . there’s a whole universe of humanity wrapped up in David Whitehouse’s much anticipated new work of non-fiction . . . Prepare to read it in one addictive sitting’
Stylist
Telegraph
‘Deliciously twisty. I raced through it in one evening’
The Times
‘A proper read-it-in-one-go book, opening up an advent calendar of lives behind the doors of a block of flats’
Adam Kay, author of This is Going to Hurt
Margate is in the grip of a heatwave when David Whitehouse stumbles across the mysterious story of a local woman who lived on the ground floor of Saltwater Mansions, a block of flats not far from the sea. On paper, Caroline Lane was unremarkable. She paid her mortgage every month. She always paid her bills. But nobody had seen or heard from her for 13 years, and no one had ever come looking. She had disappeared completely.
David quickly becomes as fascinated by this missing woman as the residents of Saltwater Mansions, all of whom have their own theories to share, and their own unique stories to tell. As his obsession grows, David unearths vital clues that private detectives and amateur investigators alike have failed to spot. But the closer he gets to the truth, the clearer it becomes that this mystery was never meant to be solved, and that some stories don’t want to be told. What if this one was never about Caroline Lane at all?
From acclaimed and award-winning author David Whitehouse, Saltwater Mansions is an astonishing work of creative non-fiction blending reportage and memoir to explore the extraordinary hidden lives of ordinary people, the impact of grief, and the dangerous allure of taking true crime stories into our own hands.
‘I inhaled it in a sitting – what an exhilarating book. Brave, revealing and unexpected’
Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of Love
‘A tremendous chronicler of real stories . . . an utterly absorbing read’
i Paper
‘Ordinary lives, family grief, true crime, the dangers of amateur sleuthing, unexpected stories . . . there’s a whole universe of humanity wrapped up in David Whitehouse’s much anticipated new work of non-fiction . . . Prepare to read it in one addictive sitting’
Stylist
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Reviews
An utterly incredible book. The memoir of a seaside town, a portrait of an absence, and a hymn of grief. I am still thinking about it
No one writes quite like David Whitehouse. On the surface this is the strange and compelling story of a missing woman in Margate but really, it's about so much more: the traces we leave, the stories we tell, what it is to be human. There's a rare and immense vulnerability to this book, which is part mystery, part memoir, and entirely, compulsively page-turning. I read Saltwater Mansions in a day. I'll be thinking about it for a long time to come
A master storyteller and one of our greatest non-fiction writers
Mixing memoir and reportage, this pageturner reads like a thriller
This is not just an investigation of a disappearance. Along the way, he questions the morality of delving into another person's private life . . . Whitehouse is interested in people, and his curiosity and ability to listen mean that he finds out the stories of others, many of them complex and coloured by past experiences . . . The small touches can make one shiver . . . Margate, too, is brought alive
Compelling, insightful, moving. I don't know where to start with describing how much I loved this book
Brilliant. A proper read-it-in-one-go book, opening up an advent calendar of lives behind the doors of a block of flats. Beautifully written, humane and soul-baring
David Whitehouse is such an original and compassionate writer. His search for the mysterious Caroline Lane is engrossing and intriguing . . . a remarkable book
A tremendous chronicler of real stories . . . Saltwater Mansions tells of the disappearance of a woman from a block of flats in Margate and is an utterly absorbing read
Ordinary lives, family grief, true crime, the dangers of amateur sleuthing, unexpected stories . . . there's a whole universe of humanity wrapped up in David Whitehouse's much anticipated new work of non-fiction . . . Prepare to read it in one addictive sitting
He's done it again. David Whitehouse's writing is always captivating, assured and on point. He is a safe pair of hands for other people's stories, always treating them with respect, honouring the lives and relationships they contain and finding the extraordinary in the everyday. Saltwater Mansions is incredibly moving. I loved it
Saltwater Mansions delves into an engrossing mystery through a kaleidoscope of lives, and the result is thrilling, moving, and searingly profound. I loved it
It's rare for a non-fiction book to feature in my top picks but this true story from journalist David Whitehouse is as gripping as any novel . . . the stories of the people he meets along the way are just as fascinating as the truth that emerges
Deliciously twisty . . . I raced through it in one evening
A gripping mystery that becomes an immersive journey into memory, legacy and grief. Saltwater Mansions is a story masterfully told by David Whitehouse, and it will stay with you long after you reach the end
Magnificently told and devastatingly moving, Saltwater Mansions is a treasure trove of human truths - a bittersweet dive into the profundity, melancholy, and strange sweetness of being alive, bound by a totally original, utterly compelling true crime narrative
Genre-bending, genius . . . a superb, intoxicating book . . . beautifully combines the diligence of fact and the verve of fiction . . . Saltwater Mansions is by turns compassionate, melancholy, perceptive and uplifting. Whitehouse's turn of phrase is exquisite, conjuring entire scenes with just a few words . . . The people and town in Saltwater Mansions maybe resolutely ordinary, but the book itself is anything but
A beautiful, humane, compelling book. What begins as a humble inquiry into a small-town missing person's case becomes a plaintive, intricately nested set of untold stories, taking in the denizens of Margate to Whitehouse's own family. Each quietly extraordinary person who's entangled in this narrative is illuminated with such vividness and compassion you can't help but recognise the fragments of your own experience in all of them. David Whitehouse has always been a brilliant writer of Britain's overlooked characters, and this is his finest work yet
A single, inexplicable disappearance opens up an array of hidden stories, probing the human instincts to know and to hide. No other writer could go out for a haircut and wind up, years later with a treatise on why we ask why? that reads like a diary, a thriller, a tribute to all the world's untold stories and the lost art and tragedies of being unknown
Irresistible . . . dazzling illustrations of the remarkable stories that can emerge from anyone . . . brilliantly told . . . Calm but seductive, uncomplicated yet profound, no matter how limited your own collection of emotions is, chances are Saltwater Mansions will cause you to lose control of most of them
I inhaled it in a sitting - what an exhilarating book. Brave, revealing and unexpected, this is a wise and original exploration of the extraordinary nature of ordinary lives and how they are interpreted by others
An incredible piece of non-fiction . . . This really got under my skin and will make you think about what we truly know about people