Black Swan Ireland – serie

WINNER of the McIlvanney Prize 2020Shortlisted for Bloody Scotland's Scottish Crime Debut of the Year 2020Longlisted for the Highland Book Prize 2020'Hugely atmospheric, exquisitely written and utterly gripping' LUCY FOLEY, author of The Hunting Party'It's both eerie and thrilling at once, and had me under its spell until the end' SOPHIE MACKINTOSH, author of Blue Ticket and The Water Cure______________They are driving home from the search party when they see her. The trees are coarse and tall in the winter light, standing like men.Lauren and her father Niall live alone in the Highlands, in a small village surrounded by pine forest. When a woman stumbles out onto the road one Halloween night, Niall drives her back to their house in his pickup. In the morning, she's gone.In a community where daughters rebel, men quietly rage, and drinking is a means of forgetting, mysteries like these are not out of the ordinary. The trapper found hanging with the dead animals for two weeks. Locked doors and stone circles. The disappearance of Lauren's mother a decade ago.Lauren looks for answers in her tarot cards, hoping she might one day be able to read her father's turbulent mind. Neighbours know more than they let on, but when local teenager Ann-Marie goes missing it's no longer clear who she can trust.In the shadow of the Highland forest, Francine Toon captures the wildness of rural childhood and the intensity of small-town claustrophobia. In a place that can feel like the edge of the word, she unites the chill of the modern gothic with the pulse of a thriller. It is the perfect novel for our haunted times.______________READERS LOVE PINE . . .'Stunning ... I was completely spellbound' *****'Mesmerising and addictive' *****'I raced through this one, absolutely adored it!' *****'Can't recommend it enough' *****'I could not pull myself away from the pages' *****

From the twice Man Booker longlisted author of From a Low and Quiet Sea 'Poetic, powerful and heart-rending' THE TIMES'An exquisite account of womanhood, friendship, prejudice and tradition that is both intimate in scale and awesome in achievement' IRISH INDEPENDENTMelody Shee is alone and in trouble. Her husband doesn't take her news too well. She can't tell her father yet because he's a good man and this could break him. She's trying to stay in the moment, but the future is looming - larger by the day - while the past won't let her go. What she did to Breedie Flynn all those years ago still haunts her.It's a good thing that she meets Mary Crothery when she does. Mary is a young Traveller woman, and she knows more about Melody than she lets on. She might just save Melody's life._________'A joy to read, for all that it breaks your heart' INDEPENDENT'One of the finest writers working in Ireland today ... worthy of Greek Drama' GUARDIAN'A stunning piece of work, utterly truthful and emotionally powerful' JOSEPH O'CONNOR'Work of genius ... I was entranced by it. Buckled by it' SEBASTIAN BARRY

The critically acclaimed psychological chiller from a powerful new voice in Irish literary fiction.SHORTLISTED FOR THE KERRY GROUP IRISH NOVEL OF THE YEAR 2017 'As fine as it is frightening' JOHN BANVILLE 'This one will stay with you like your shadow' Guardian 'Extraordinary . . . pitch-perfect' Irish Times'Strange, beautiful and quietly terrifying' DONAL RYAN, author of The Spinning Heart'Like many great works, it could so easily have all gone wrong if it hadn’t been done exactly right' Sunday Independent It is the hottest August in living memory.A frightened girl bangs on a door. A man answers. From the moment he invites her in, his world will never be the same again.She will tell him about her family, and their strange life in the show home of an abandoned housing estate. The long, blistering days spent sunbathing; the airless nights filled with inexplicable noises; the words that appear on the windows, written in dust.Why are members of her family disappearing, one by one? Is she telling the truth? Is he? In a world where reality is beginning to blur, how can we know what to believe?