Garnethill - Hardcover

Denise Mina

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0593043510 ISBN 13: 9780593043516

Publisher: Bantam Press, 1998

Synopsis

"A shattering first novel... You can't look away from it."--New York Times Book Review

Maureen O'Donnell wakes up one morning to find her therapist boyfriend murdered in the middle of her living room and herself a prime suspect in a murder case. Desperate to clear her name and to get at the truth, Maureen traces rumors about a similar murder at a local psychiatric hospital, uncovering a trail of deception and repressed scandal that could exonerate her - or make her the next victim.

"I can't think of a more interesting - and less likely - crime hero than Maureen O'Donnell, the damaged but determined center of Denise Mina's marvelous debut mystery. . . . The book bristles with angry energy and the spare urban poetry of its unique language." -Chicago Tribune

"A groundbreaking book...its emotional rawness and visceral honesty pack a punch more potent than any boxer-turned-PI could provide."--Washington Post Book World

"This raw, powerful story is an exceptional debut." -Kansas City Star

"A compelling story. . . . This is the reason we read mysteries." -Rocky Mountain News

About this title

Review

Garnethill (the name of a bleak Glasgow suburb) won the John Creasey Memorial Award for Best First Crime Novel--the British equivalent of the Edgar. It's a book that crackles with mordant Scottish wit and throbs with the pain of badly treated mental illness, managing to be both truly frightening and immensely exhilarating at the same time.

Maureen O'Donnell, surely one of the most unlikely crime solvers in recent history, comes from a family so seriously dysfunctional that it deserves a television series of its own. Her mother is an overly dramatic alcoholic who "could scene-steal from an eclipse"; her brother Liam is a bumbling drug dealer; and the black sheep of the family is a sister who went to London and became a Thatcherite. The troubled but gutsy Maureen decides to dump her boyfriend, Douglas--an abusive (and married) psychologist she met while a patient at a sex-abuse clinic. After a night of drinking with a friend who's a social worker, Maureen wakes up to find that Douglas has been tied to a kitchen chair in her flat with his throat slashed. As someone with both a motive and a history of mental illness, Maureen is the most likely suspect--until a second, similar murder occurs that links the crimes to a local psychiatric hospital. Denise Mina, who has a background in health care, law, and criminology, is definitely a writer to watch. --Dick Adler

About the Author

Denise Mina is the author of Deception, the Garnethill trilogy, and Field of Blood. She lives in Glasgow, Scotland, with her family.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bantam Press
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0593043510
• ISBN 13: 9780593043516
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 329