Break and Enter - Softcover

Colin Harrison

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0747574219 ISBN 13: 9780747574217

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, 2005

Synopsis

By appearances Peter Scattergood leads a privileged life: a post as Assistant District Attorney, a loving wife, and a townhouse in Philadelphia's exclusive Society Hill. Assigned to an explosive homicide case - the murder of the mayor's nephew and the young man's beautiful mistress - the power and prestige he's always craved seem within his grasp. But soon the illusion of success shatters. His wife walks out on their seven-year marriage. The double-murder case casts a shadow of doubt on his most trusted peers. And, in a moment of weakness, Peter enters into an affair with a woman whose greatest skill is arousing suspicion. With everything spinning out of control, Peter is driven by rage into the blackest depths of corruption and perversity - following a twisted obsession for justice that will force him to break the law he has sworn to uphold: to punish the innocent as well as the guilty.

About this title

About the Author

Colin Harrison is the deputy editor of Harper's magazine and the author of Bodies Electric, Afterburn, Manhattan Nocturne and The Havana Room. He lives with his wife, novelist Kathryn Harrison, in Brooklyn, USA.

From Publishers Weekly

In this exceptionally solid debut thriller, Peter Scattergood, a promising young Philadelphia assistant DA, is handed the case of his career--the double murder of the mayor's nephew and the nephew's girlfriend--just as his marriage falls apart. Left with mounting bills when his wife moves out, an overwhelming workload and a mother ill with cancer, Scattergood, descendant of Quaker patricians, finds his morals and ethics severely tested. Though he wants to save his marriage, he becomes involved with sex-hungry bank vice-president Cassandra; his closest ally in the DA's office is succumbing to a cocaine addiction; their boss tries to speed Scattergood's murder prosecution; and the facts of the case grow increasingly contradictory, suggesting implication of the mayor. Harrison knows the details of criminal prosecution and the Philadelphia ambience, and the dual threads of his plot--crumbling marriage, crumbling career--are ingeniously complementary. Although Harrison's occasionally overwrought prose can take on a dizzying, almost hallucinogenic effect, he really knows how to spin a tale, and his novel is intelligent, absorbing and satisfying.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0747574219
• ISBN 13: 9780747574217
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 311