Mad Mabel: A Novel

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

From New York Times bestselling author Sally Hepworth comes a twisty tale of justice, redemption, and one irrepressible woman who’s not done breaking the rules just yet.

Meet Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick: eighty-one years old, gloriously grumpy, fiercely independent, and never without a hot cup of tea―or a cutting remark. She minds her own business in her quiet Melbourne suburb, until a neighbor turns up dead and the whispers start flying.

Because Elsie hasn’t always been Elsie. Once upon a headline, she was Mad Mabel Waller―Australia’s youngest convicted murderer. But was she really mad, or just misunderstood? Either way, she’s kept her secret buried for decades.

Enter seven-year-old Persephone, a relentless little chatterbox who has just moved in across the road (armed with stickers, questions, and no sense of personal boundaries); Joan, who appears to have it in for Elsie; and a healthy dose of public interest―the cops are sniffing around, and the media is circling like seagulls at a picnic.

So Mabel does what she’s always done best―she takes matters into her own hands.

Is she a cantankerous old lady with a shady past? A cold-blooded killer with arthritis? Or just someone who’s finally ready to tell her side of the story?

Sharp, surprising, and wickedly funny, this is the unforgettable story of a woman who’s spent a lifetime being underestimated―and is about to prove everyone wrong. Again.

Sally Hepworth is the New York Times bestselling author of nine novels, including The Good Sister and The Soulmate. Her latest novel, Darling Girls, was released in Australia in September 2023, and will be released in North America in April 2024.

Drawing on the good, the bad and the downright odd of human behaviour, Sally writes incisively about family, relationships and identity. Her domestic thriller novels are laced with quirky humour, sass and a darkly charming tone. They are available worldwide in English and have been translated into twenty languages.

Sally lives in Melbourne, Australia, with her three children and one adorable dog. She has recently taken up ocean swimming (or to put it more accurately, ocean dipping)

“Mad Mabel” by Sally Hepworth is a twisty mystery about an elderly woman, Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick, who has spent decades hiding a dangerous past. At eighty-one, she lives quietly on Kenny Lane, a street she has called home for sixty years, and most people see her as just a grumpy, private old lady who likes keeping an eye on everyone else’s business. But beneath that ordinary image is a history she has worked hard to bury, because long ago she became known as “Mad Mabel,” a name tied to murder and scandal. The novel moves between the present day and the past, slowly revealing how Elsie became the person she is and why her life has been defined by secrecy, fear, and survival.

In the present, Elsie’s carefully controlled world begins to collapse after one of her neighbors dies under suspicious circumstances. Because she is the one who finds the body, and because someone knows more about her history than they should, suspicion quickly shifts toward her. The police begin looking at her closely, and the neighborhood gossip grows louder. What had once been a quiet life of isolation becomes a public spectacle, with Elsie forced back into a spotlight she has avoided for years. The story uses this pressure to raise the central question of whether she is truly guilty of the things people assume about her, or whether she has simply been trapped by a reputation built on misunderstanding and old fear.

The present-day mystery is deepened by the arrival of a lively seven-year-old neighbor named Persephone, who is curious, talkative, and impossible to ignore. Persephone becomes fascinated by Elsie and keeps pushing past the barriers she has built around herself. Their relationship gives the novel warmth and emotional tension at the same time, because the little girl’s innocence contrasts with Elsie’s guarded nature and painful history. Through this bond, the novel shows how trust can grow in unexpected places, even between two people who seem to have nothing in common. It also becomes clear that Elsie’s greatest fear is not only being blamed for another death, but losing control over the story of her own life.

The “Then” chapters trace Elsie back to childhood and adolescence, showing how her nickname “Mad Mabel” came to define her. These sections reveal a life shaped by neglect, cruelty, bullying, and emotional pain, along with rare moments of care and protection, especially from an aunt who helps nurture her. The past is not presented as a simple tale of innocence or guilt; instead, it shows a young girl trying to survive in a difficult world where adults fail her, gossip spreads quickly, and violence can seem both shocking and inevitable. The novel suggests that the events leading to Elsie’s conviction were tangled up in fear, power, and misunderstanding, making her story as much about injustice and survival as about crime.

As the two timelines move closer together, the book gradually exposes how much of Elsie’s adult life has been built around concealment. She has kept her real identity hidden, hoping that time and silence would protect her. But once the past resurfaces, she is forced to confront old truths and the possibility that the people around her may have judged her too quickly for too long. The novel’s suspense comes not just from the murder investigation, but from the emotional question of whether Elsie can finally tell her side of the story before someone else defines it for her. That tension gives the book its strongest drive, turning it into both a mystery and a character study.

At its heart, Mad Mabel is a story about memory, reputation, and the damage caused by assumptions. It explores how a person can be reduced to a nickname, a headline, or a rumor, while the full truth remains buried for years. Sally Hepworth uses humor, tenderness, and suspense to create a novel that is both entertaining and emotionally layered. The book is not only about solving a death, but about understanding how a woman who was once a frightened child became an elderly suspect, and whether justice can ever fully separate fact from the stories people tell about each other.