THE DISAPPEARANCE AT WAIHEKE: THE KŌWHAI BAY MYSTERIES

A relaxing wine weekend on Waiheke Island turns into a chilling mystery when Beryl Ashwin, a quiet and well-liked resident of Beacon Point, vanishes from her vineyard lodge room before breakfast. Her bed is neatly made, her bag and passport are gone, and her phone is found hidden in a hedge — leaving Arthur Bennett and the Beacon Point residents' committee with one impossible question: did Beryl leave by choice, or was she forced to disappear?

As suspicion falls on an aggressive vineyard investor with a history of pressure tactics, the committee follows a trail of half-truths, old photographs, financial clues, and buried identities. But the deeper Arthur, Dorothy, Warwick, Margaret, Michael, Helen, and Valerie dig, the clearer it becomes that Beryl's disappearance is not about a weekend land dispute. It reaches back more than thirty years, to a secret life built around fear, courage, and one brave act that someone has never forgotten.

With Detective Rangi Walker trying to keep the investigation on lawful ground — and the committee learning, painfully, that confidence can be as dangerous as ignorance — The Disappearance at Waiheke becomes a mystery about trust, accountability, and the cost of protecting the people you love.

Warm, suspenseful, and full of the dry wit that defines the Kōwhai Bay Mysteries, this seventh book reveals that sometimes vanishing is not an ending at all — but the beginning of being truly found.