Based on a true story, Tell Anna She's Safe is the tale of two women, one missing, the other searching for her. Driving home alongside West Quebec's Gatineau River one April afternoon, researcher Ellen McGinn spots a parked car that looks like it might belong to her friend and colleague, Lucy Stockman. Lucy, a freelance writer, lives in nearby Ottawa. Shortly after arriving home, Ellen receives a phone call from Lucy's common-law partner: Lucy has disappeared. That night Ellen has an unusual dream in which she receives three clear messages: she is to search and to write everything down--and Lucy is safe. But is she? Ellen's continuing dreams seem to indicate otherwise, and then there is the suspicious behaviour of Lucy's partner, a man with a violent past that includes a manslaughter conviction. Led by a series of disturbing visions she doubts but can't ignore, Ellen embarks on a nerve-wracking search that takes her to wooded areas, abandoned buildings, and even the river. But what begins as a physical search soon also becomes a determined quest for the truth beyond the stereotypical appearances of her friend's risky relationship. Terrified for her own life and getting in over her head with a compelling police detective, Ellen reaches a deeper than bargained for understanding of Lucy's dark journey--and of her own psychic abilities. Through the intertwining stories of the two women and the enduring presence of the river, Tell Anna She's Safe takes the reader below the sometimes frightening, uncontrollable surface circumstances of our lives, to reveal the steady current of power and knowing we all hold within.
Brenda Missen's short fiction has been published in the crime anthology, Cottage Country Killers, and in the Algonquin Roundtable Review. Her fiction was awarded second prize in the 1996 Ottawa Independent Writers' short story contest. Her work has also been published in Canadian Wildlife, Canoeroots, Kanawa, and her local newspaper, Barry's Bay This Week. Born, raised, and educated in Toronto, Brenda Missen now lives on the Madawaska River in rural central Ontario.