Aardvark Book Club Fan Club (Not Official) discussion

Frances Adams always said she'd be murdered. She was right.

It’s 1965 and teenage Frances Adams is at an English country fair with her two best friends. But Frances’s life takes a hairpin turn when a fortune-teller makes a bone-chilling prediction: One day, Frances will be murdered. Frances spends a lifetime trying to solve a crime that hasn’t happened yet, compiling dirt on every person who crosses her path in an effort to prevent her own demise. For decades, no one takes Frances seriously. Until that is, nearly sixty years later, when Frances is found murdered.

In the present day, Annie Adams has been summoned to a meeting at the sprawling country estate of her wealthy and reclusive great aunt Frances. But by the time Annie arrives in the quaint English village of Castle Knoll, Frances is already dead. Annie is determined to catch the killer, but thanks to Frances’s lifelong habit of digging up secrets, it seems every endearing and eccentric villager might just have a motive for her murder.

Can Annie safely unravel the dark mystery at the heart of Castle Knoll, or will dredging up the past throw her into the path of a killer? As Annie gets closer to the truth, and closer to the danger, she starts to fear she might inherit her great aunt’s fate instead of her fortune.

10 chapters

wow, the lyric prophecy is scary but interesting to see how it will all come together

Prophecy (in chapter 1):

Your Future Contains Dry Bones (view spoiler)[ this was checked off, but recently. What could this be? (hide spoiler)]
Your slow demise begins right when you hold the queen in the palm of one hand. (view spoiler)[was it started when Elva and (was it Oliver?) got married? or something else? (hide spoiler)]
Beware the bird, for it will betray you. And from that, there's no coming back. (view spoiler)[ this seems like it could be Emily - but does it mean something later - closer to Annie's day - like Detective Crane? (hide spoiler)]
But daughters are the key to justice, find the right one and keep her close. (view spoiler)[I hope this means Annie. I hope she stays close and solves it! (hide spoiler)]
All signs point toward your murder. (view spoiler)[ is this her murder board? Or will it be something more? (hide spoiler)]

So far (view spoiler)[ I really like Annie. She's sweet - I like that she talked to the gardener.
I wonder why the guy in the car was weird. what was his problem? and why ditch her?

and I'm interested to learn why John is not a good guy, why Emily was being mean, why both emily and her date were being mean specifically to John and Rose. and why did Ford and the boy know all about them?

and what happened to Emily? (hide spoiler)]

20 chapters

and (view spoiler)[ I still don't have any guesses! I assumed Emily was really dead - Frances said something in her writing that made me think that
but I'm still not sure what happened.

I'm also curious how John explained what he'd done

was it really Ford's baby? I think it was John's.
What a horrible friend Emily was

and I don't like grown up Saxon or Elva - but I'm not sure either murdered her - even if that would be the easy answer

but could Rose have killed Emily? and Frances covered it up? hmmmmmm (hide spoiler)]