False Friends

Some encounters change more than you realise.

Bianca’s world begins to shift long before she sets foot in Málaga. A brief meeting with Ramón in South Africa — a man whose calm precision masks something far more complicated — stays with her at a moment when grief has already hollowed her life. When he later encourages her to spend a short stay at Instituto Guerrera, it feels like exactly the escape she needs.

But Málaga is not the sanctuary she imagined.
The school is polished, respected… and quietly unsettling.
Odd changes in behaviour, whispers of unusual teaching methods, and a subtle pressure beneath everyday interactions make Bianca question what she has stepped into. And Ramón — attentive, controlled, always present — becomes increasingly difficult to read.

Just as she begins to find her footing, a figure from her past re-emerges — unexpected, disruptive, and impossible to ignore. The life she thought she had left behind follows her across continents, pulling old truths and buried fears to the surface.

As Bianca becomes more deeply entangled with the school, she realises she isn’t simply learning a language — she is being shaped by forces she doesn’t yet understand.

Subjunctive Mood is the first book in the False Friends series — a psychological thriller about obsession, manipulation, and the perilous space between what is said and what is meant.