Halfway House

On her first shift at an Edinburgh halfway house for violent offenders, a young woman is taken hostage ... and that's just the beginning... The twisty, shocking, darkly funny thriller by award-winning author Helen FitzGerald. `A new novel from Helen Fitzgerald is always a major event ... magnificent´ Mark Billingham `Outrageous, hilarious and dark as hell - this is Helen FitzGerald on absolute top form´ Doug Johnstone `[Lou] is irresistible and very funny ... The set-up is fascinating, the narrative is both fast-moving and convincing´ Literary Review _______ They`re the housemates from Hell... When her disastrous Australian love affair ends, Lou O´Dowd heads to Edinburgh for a fresh start, moving in with her cousin, and preparing for the only job she can find ... working at a halfway house for very high-risk offenders. Two killers, a celebrity paedophile and a paranoid coke dealer - all out on parole and all sharing their outwardly elegant Edinburgh townhouse with rookie night-worker Lou... And instead of finding some meaning and purpose to her life, she finds herself trapped in a terrifying game of cat and mouse where she stands to lose everything - including her life. Slick, darkly funny and nerve-janglingly tense, Halfway House is both a breathtaking thriller and an unapologetic reminder never to corner a desperate woman... __________________________ `Tense, claustrophobic and laugh-out-loud funny ... an amazingly talented writer´ Michael Wood `A genius combination of horror, humour and humanity´ B M Carroll Praise for Helen FitzGerald **Shortlisted for Theakston Crime Novel of the Year** `Sharp, shocking and savagely funny´ Chris Whitaker `Dark, dark, deliciously dark´ Amanda Jennings `Wickedly funny, breath-stealingly tense and utterly chilling´ Miranda Dickinson `The main character is one of the most extraordinary you`ll meet between the pages of a book´ Ian Rankin `Sublime´ Guardian `A dark, comic masterpiece´ Mark Edwards `Urgent, angry, absolutely terrifying´ Erin Kelly `Tantalisingly powerful´ The Times `The classic thriller gets a hell of a twist´ Heat `FitzGerald writes like a more focused Irvine Welsh or a less misogynist Philip Roth´ Daily Telegraph `Domestic life is rarely served up quite so dark as this´ Sun

Helen FitzGerald is the bestselling author of ten adult and young adult thrillers, including The Donor (2011) and The Cry (2013), which was longlisted for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, and is now a major drama for BBC1. Helen worked as a criminal justice social worker for over fifteen years. She grew up in Victoria, Australia. She now lives in Glasgow with her husband.