Front Page Fridays Week-58
Front Page Fridays Week-58
Welcome to Front Page Fridays Week-58. On Fridays I showcase the first page of a new book.
My Front Page Fridays Week-58 guest is Beck Lewis with Safe Space. It is the third title in the Dead Ends crime fiction series and is published today.
Here’s the opening:
1
You can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family. Whoever came up with that was having a pop at their family, yeah?
They’d probably feel the same about their friends if they all lived under the same roof. Ten people in a house, all of a similar age. Should be a blast…
Why is it then that at least twice a week I wake up to the sound of yelling. About what? Some domestic crap or another.
Wouldn’t mind, but I live on the top floor. Not sure if I’m a light sleeper, or my housemates all like to play out their drama at top volume. It’s both. Definitely both.
Some days though, I think I’d rather have the yelling. There’s a tension in the house today. A quiet, horrible tension.
I’ve spent the day avoiding everyone.
Not quite everyone. There’s always someone that you stick close with – in my case it’s Erin, my sister from another mister. We work together at East City College on Wellington Street – we both teach science to generally indifferent sixteen to eighteen year olds – live together in this delightful shared house and most weekends we just hang out together, drinking, shopping, occasionally building up the willpower to go swimming together.
Not this weekend. She’s going to be away in Liverpool until Sunday evening to visit her little Irish grandmother.
I walk Erin to the door.
It’s dark out already. September’s here and the evenings are closing in hard.
She turns on the doorstep, rucksack in her hand, her other arm across her torso. “What are you going to do?” she says.
I sigh and shrug. I try to make it a happy sigh. “I dunno. Might just binge that Netflix series about the Menendez Brothers. The ones who killed their parents.”
“Sounds like fun,” she says. “I meant about Theo. The argument.”
I was trying not to think about that.
I smile. “You know what they say?”
“No point crying over spilt milk?”
“I was more thinking, ‘it is what it is.’”
“That’s what cowards say.”
Beyond the hedges at the front, a car beeps. Erin’s taxi.
“Gotta go,” she says.
“I’ll message you,” I call as she dashes to the taxi.
I wait until the cab pulls away. It’s drizzling. She’s gone in the dark.
I go inside and shut the door.
I live on the fourth floor of a large house on Oakleaf Road that’s subdivided into eleven ‘studio apartments’’ aka en-suite bedrooms. There’s the shared kitchen on the ground floor, too small for more than three of us to use at once, and a shared lounge which smells constantly of the weed that Jamie claims he doesn’t smoke. Farhad has the flat by the front door. He invariably pops his head out when you come in, moaning about the slamming of the door.
Going up, there’s Drake, Jamie, Erin on the first floor. On the second there’s Giovanni and the recently moved in couple – she’s called Destiny but I can’t recall if he’s Lyle or Kyle or Miles or what. On the third there’s Theo and Rosalind. You can always tell Theo’s in because you can hear his music. He doesn’t ‘believe’ in headphones. I don’t know that headphones need you to believe in them.
I stop by Theo’s door.
I stand by his door and raise my fist to knock. I can picture it. He answers, we discuss, make a start on sorting out some of the weirdness in this place.
But it’s Friday night. I’m shattered in more ways than one. I’ve got a ten-part true crime drama to binge.
It’s easier to do nothing - so I do nothing.
I take myself up the final flight of stairs, already yawning, and tell myself it’ll be better to tackle the housemates after a full night’s sleep.
There’s no way I could have known that when I next woke up, five of my housemates would be dead and I would come this close to being the sixth.
About Safe Space
When your memories are missing, how do you know you’re not the one to blame?
A year after a carbon monoxide accident left five people dead, Cassie O’Donnell wakes from a coma to find her life erased. She’s homeless, unemployed, and her mind is filled with shadowy memories she can’t trust.
Desperate for answers, Cassie joins a support group run by the survivors - a safe space where they can grieve and heal together. But then one member of the group dies of an apparent drugs overdose…
An ex-girlfriend begs DS Rob Joseph to investigate this latest death and he secretly joins the support group. But he soon discovers that the survivors are all carrying secrets.
Both Cassie and Rob begin to suspect that someone inside the group knows what really happened in that house on the night of the accident - and is willing to kill to keep the truth buried.
One tragedy. Five survivors. No one is safe.
Purchase Links
The sales page for Safe Space is https://www.amazon.co.uk/Safe-Space-Dead-Ends-Book-ebook/dp/B0GFXZFKWP
The series page is https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0GFY51WR8
About Beck Lewis
I’m Beck Lewis, a writer who has spent most of my adult life immersed in stories. Writing is the way I make sense of the world. I believe deeply that stories exist to connect people, to help us see the world through perspectives that are not our own.
I’ve spent years in writing groups, workshops, conventions, and creative spaces, learning both from established voices and from those taking their first steps. Just as importantly, I spend time around readers. Readers are at the heart of everything I do, because no writer exists in isolation. The relationship between writer and reader is a partnership built on trust, curiosity, and the shared love of stories.
Creativity doesn’t start or stop with writing for me. It spills over into short films, social media videos and collaborative projects. I love experimenting, meeting people, and finding unexpected ways to bring stories to life. If you see me at an event, there’s a good chance something fun or unusual is happening.
I’m fortunate to call writing my full-time work, though my life before that took me through a variety of jobs and experiences that shaped the way I see things. I’ve written many books in the past—some bestselling, some optioned for adaptation. I have a genuine desire to share stories that matter.
Social Media Links
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61576580986744
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/becklewiswrites
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@becklewis5
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BeckLewisWrites
Website: https://becklewis.com/
I hope you enjoyed reading Front Page Fridays Week-58. Please come back next time when I’ll be featuring a different author and the first page of their book.
And please take a look at books already featured on Front Page Fridays:
1. Blood Ribbons by Lin Le Versha – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/front-page-fridays-week-1/
2. Fatal Blow by Brian Price – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/front-page-fridays-week-2/
3. Can I Trust You? by Rob Gittins – Front Page Fridays Week-3 – Rachel Sargeant
4. The Last Bird of Paradise by AJ Aberford – Front Page Fridays Week-4 – Rachel Sargeant
5. Never Forgive You by Hilly Barmby – Front Page Fridays Week-5 – Rachel Sargeant
6. The Mists of Pencarrack Moor by Terri Nixon – Front Page Fridays Week-6 - Rachel Sargeant
7. The Thief of Joy by Stacey Murray – Front Page Fridays Week-7 - Rachel Sargeant
8. Edge of the Land by Malcolm Hollingdrake – Front Page Fridays Week-8 - Rachel Sargeant
9. The Mind of a Murderer by Michael Wood - https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/front-page-fridays-week-9/
10. The Midnight Man by Julie Anderson – Front Page Fridays Week-10 - Rachel Sargeant
11. Dark Road Home by Sheila Bugler – Front Page Fridays Week-11 - Rachel Sargeant
12. Her Charming Man by Rachel Sargeant – Front Page Fridays Week-12 - Rachel Sargeant
13. Wedding Bells at the Lakeside Hotel by Linda Huber – Front Page Fridays Week-13 - Rachel Sargeant
14. Dark Island by Daniel Aubrey – Front Page Fridays Week-14 - Rachel Sargeant
15. The Shame by Maureen Myant – Front Page Fridays Week-15 - Rachel Sargeant
16. Dead Mile by Jo Furniss – Front Page Fridays Week-16 — Rachel Sargeant
17. The Violin and Candlestick by David Jarvis – Front Page Fridays Week-17 — Rachel Sargeant
18. New Memories by S.E. Shepherd – Front Page Fridays Week-18 — Rachel Sargeant
19. Young Blood by Victoria Gemmell – Front Page Fridays Week-19 — Rachel Sargeant
20. Private Investigations by Rob Gittins – Front Page Fridays Week-20 — Rachel Sargeant
21. The Car Horn revolution by A.J. Aberford – Front Page Fridays Week-21 — Rachel Sargeant
22. What Lies Beneath by Maureen Myant – Front Page Fridays Week-22 — Rachel Sargeant
23. A Safe Place by Stephanie Carty – Front Page Fridays Week-23 — Rachel Sargeant
24. Fatal Image by Brian Price – Front Page Fridays Week-24 — Rachel Sargeant
25. Run For Your Lies by A.A. Abbott – Front Page Fridays Week-25 — Rachel Sargeant
26. A Walk in the Park by Natalie Kleinman – Front Page Fridays Week-26 — Rachel Sargeant
27. A Storm in a Teacup by Rachael Gray – Front Page Fridays Week-27 — Rachel Sargeant
28. The Midnight Bookshop by Amanda James – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/blog/front-page-fridays-week-28
29. A Death in the Afternoon by Julie Anderson – Front Page Fridays Week-29 — Rachel Sargeant
30. Justice by Madalyn Morgan – Front Page Fridays Week-30 — Rachel Sargeant
31. Let Me Out by Amanda Brittany – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/blog/front-page-fridays-week-31
32. A Pocketful of Poisons by Brian Price – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/blog/85orb6bc15cs2voyn37yv3jprw0jec
33. Tribute by Madalyn Morgan – Front Page Fridays Week-33 — Rachel Sargeant
34. Mistress of the Manor by Cara Clayton – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/blog/front-page-fridays-week-34
35. Waves of Change in Pelican Crossing by Maggie Chistensen – Front Page Fridays Week-35 — Rachel Sargeant
36. A French Inheritance by Jennifer Bohnet – Front Page Fridays Week-36
37. Beneath the Same Moon by AS Andrejevic – Front Page Fridays Week-37 — Rachel Sargeant
38. The Fallen by Maureen Myant - Front Page Fridays Week-38 — Rachel Sargeant
39. The Bad Women by Jennie Ensor – Front Page Fridays Week-39 — Rachel Sargeant
40. Lies Between Friends by AA Abbott – Front Page Fridays Week-40 — Rachel Sargeant
41. Ftal Shot by Brian Brice – My Front Page Fridays Week-41 — Rachel Sargeant
42. The Alibi by Katharine Johnson – My Front Page Fridays Week-42 — Rachel Sargeant
43. The Croatian Island Library by Eva Glyn – https://www.rachelsargeant.co.uk/blog/front-page-fridays-week-43
44. If I Were You by Helen Matthews – Front Page Fridays Week-44 — Rachel Sargeant
45. (Not Quite) Done With Dating by Bella Osborne
46. Poison at the Wild Haggis Bookshop by Jackie Baldwin
47. Beattie Cavendish and the Highland Hideaway by Mary-Jane Riley
48. Missing… Rose Malone by Linda Huber
50. 27 Church Street by A.J. Hobart
51. The Girls of Maple Close by Amanda Brittany
52. Growing Old Disgracefully by Karen King
53. Meet Me At Apple Blossom Lane by Anita Faulkner
54. Festival Days by Julie Anderson
55. The Conservatory by Anthony Aberford