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 _______ Theyre the housemates from Hell When her disastrous Australian love affair ends, Lou ODowd 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