House of Shame

Sanctuary for the lost… or an incubator of hatred and revenge?

Australia, Victoria. Detective Sergeant Eleanor Smith finally gets her first murder case. In Harrowford Hall, a shelter for single mothers in the rural countryside, a woman's body has been discovered — a local nurse; it is clear that she was poisoned.
For decades, Harrowford Hall has been infamous as a "shelter for girls in crisis." Like fourteen-year-old Jane McAvoy, who has no idea how she became pregnant. Or Marilyn Pollard, a frightened, embittered teenage girl desperately trying to escape. They were brought here by parents afraid of scandal.
But when Detective Smith arrives at the once majestic Gothic mansion, she finds it nearly empty — the shelter is being urgently closed. However, the overgrown cemetery nearby makes her think that the poisoning of Nurse Chapman may not be the first suspicious death at Harrowford Hall… Where have all the "wards" of this shelter gone? And, most importantly, what about their children born here? It seems the investigation won’t be easy…