Andrew Taylor is a master storyteller' Daily Telegraph sophisticated writer with a high degree of literary expertise.

As Andrew Taylor triumphandy proves ... there is still room for excellence.

Like Hitchcock, Taylor pitches extreme and gothic events within a hair's breadth of normality.

What's rare and admirable in Taylor's fiction is his painterly and poetic skill in transforming the humdrum into something emblematic and important.

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James wasn't much more than a child when he had an affair with Lily. And now, twenty-four years later, Lily confesses to James that their affair led to a daughter, Kate.

And Kate desperately needs her father's help:she's wanted for murder.

But there is no room for murder in James's life. He has a wife, a good job, a nice house in the country... As Kate comes crashing into his world, so she lights the fuse under his ordered life. Because James has also been keeping a secret - a very dark and deadly one...