The Soulmate, by Sally Hepworth

Gabe and Pippa and their two small girls live near a cliff that has become a suicide spot, a couple of hours out of Melbourne. In the few years they have lived there Gabe has become a life-saver, specialising in talking people down from the edge. When a woman goes over while Gabe is talking to her, the shock and distress triggers an unravelling of secrets and a murky history that threatens to lead to more deaths. The story alternates between the points of view of Pippa and Amanda, the dead woman, in short sharp chapters that detail their marriages and what happened before and after the fateful day. Pippa makes an interesting narrator, so in love with her husband she is blind to his faults – despite bitter experience. Amanda as an omniscient ghost is an odd device that doesn’t quite work. There are plot holes and a sloppiness of detail that detract from the story, which is far-fetched in the extreme. The style and tone is reminiscent of Liane Moriarty's books, featuring women who stand by their men against all comers, until they don’t.