Totem

The gripping new crime thriller from the BAFTA-winning screenwriter of BBC One's Keeping Faith and bestselling author of the Jenny Cooper Coroner novels.

On the very day Jessie Cunningham achieves her lifelong ambition of becoming a partner at one of Toronto's most powerful law firms, she suffers a catastrophic burnout.

Seeking time to recover, she volunteers with a charity dedicated to preserving ancient forests in the wilderness of British Columbia. There she meets Todd Samson, a man with a troubled past and a wounded soul. Their attraction is immediate—but they come from very different worlds, worlds that are about to collide.

When Todd is falsely accused of murdering a local conservation officer, his already beleaguered community in the Three Valleys Reserve comes under intense pressure from the government to surrender its ancestral lands in exchange for territory on the outskirts of Vancouver.

Drawn into a battle against greed, corruption, and injustice, Jessie finds herself standing alongside Chief Ray Squinas and wood carver and shaman Eldon Marshall. Together, they confront powerful interests determined to exploit the land—and Jessie is forced to challenge the very system she has spent her career serving.

A gripping, thought-provoking thriller, this novel combines courtroom drama, environmental conflict, and moral reckoning in a powerful story of justice, identity, and redemption.