Throw Me to the Wolves

"Compulsively readable."--New York Times Book Review

A significant literary achievement that also happens to be a terrific page-turner.- Jonathan Lee

Elegantly written, darkly entertaining.- John Banville

An extraordinary writer of great compassion . . . Stunning.- Denise Mina

In the aftermath of Brexit, the body of a young woman is found by the river Thames, and a neighbor, a retired teacher from Chapleton College, is arrested. An eccentric loner--intellectual, shy, a fastidious dresser with expensive tastes--he is the perfect candidate for a media monstering.

In custody he is interviewed by two detectives: the circumspect Ander, and his workaday foil, Gary. Ander is particularly watchful now, because the man across the table is someone he knows--someone he hasn't seen in nearly thirty years. Determined to salvage the truth as ex-pupils and colleagues line up against the accused, he must face a story from decades back, from his own time as a Chapleton student, at the peak of anti-Irish sentiment.

With the momentum of classic crime fiction, Throw Me to the Wolves follows two mysteries--one unfolding in the media-saturated present, and the other bubbling up from the abusive past of the 1980s English school system. Beautifully written and psychologically acute, it is a novel about memory and childhood, prescient and piercingly funny, as wise as it is tragic.