Play to the End by Robert Goddard

Actor Toby Flood, formerly of big and small screen, arrives in Brighton on the first Sunday in December with the other cast members of the Joe Orton play Lodger in the Throat. They have been on tour since September and are looking forward to the end of the run the following Saturday.

Flood is visited that night by his estranged wife, Jenny, now living with wealthy entrepreneur Roger Colborn, whose country residence, Wickhurst Manor, lies just north of Brighton. Jenny runs a shop in the Lanes and is worried about a strange man who has taken to hanging around outside. Roger has dismissed her concerns and she hopes instead that Toby will be willing for old times' sake to follow the man and get to the bottom of his behaviour: Reluctantly, Toby agrees.

Next day he trails the man to his house and confronts him. Derek Oswin is an unemployed loner who blames Colborn for his father's death from cancer, on account of dangerous practices at the defunct plastics factory run by Roger and his father, the late Sir William Colborn. Many other workers at the factory met a similar fate and Oswin wants to remind Colborn of what he should have on his conscience. Circumstances conspire to draw Flood further and further into Oswin's life. Colborn gets wind of Flood's contact with Jenny and tries to buy him off, but Flood sees only a longed-for opportunity to win Jenny back. Before he fully understands the risks he is running, he finds himself entangled in the mysterious - and dangerous - relationship between the Oswins and the Colborns. The prospects for his survival until the close of the show suddenly start to look very far from good.

Review:
A fascinating mystery, that unravels a web of intricate tales of family intertwining. Fascinating to the end.

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