Blacklands
  • Published: 1 July 2010
  • ISBN: 9781409094197
  • Imprint: Transworld Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 368

Blacklands

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CRIME NOVEL OF THE YEAR 2010! This powerful psychological debut will leave you breathless . . .

FROM THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF SNAP
'Extraordinarily powerful and evocative . . . will leave you breathless.' Daily Mirror
VOTED CRIME NOVEL OF THE YEAR when it was first released, and still the most gripping, powerful thriller debut you will read this year.

___

Steven Lamb is 12 when he writes his first letter . . . to a serial killer

Every day after school, whilst his classmates swap football stickers, twelve-year-old Steven digs holes on Exmoor, hoping to find a body. His uncle disappeared aged eleven and is assumed to have fallen victim to the notorious serial killer Arnold Avery - but his body has never been found.

Steven's Nan does not believe her son is dead. She still waits for him to come home, standing bitter guard at the front window while her family fragments around her. Steven is determined to heal the widening cracks between them before it's too late - even if that means presenting his grandmother with the bones of her murdered son.

But when Steven realises this is an impossible task, he crafts a careful letter to Arnold Avery in prison. And there begins a dangerous cat-and-mouse game between a desperate child and a bored psychopath . . .

Readers love Blacklands:

'A dark, gripping story . . . full of tension' *****
'A truly chilling and disturbing read' *****
'An intelligent crime thriller that seeps with atmosphere' *****

*Belinda Bauer's pulse-pounding new thriller, EXIT, is out now*
  • Published: 1 July 2010
  • ISBN: 9781409094197
  • Imprint: Transworld Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 368
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About the author

Belinda Bauer

Belinda Bauer grew up in England and South Africa and now lives in Wales. She worked as a journalist and a screenwriter before finally writing a book to appease her nagging mother.

For her debut, Blacklands, Belinda was awarded the CWA Gold Dagger for Crime Novel of the Year. She went on to win the CWA Dagger in the Library for her body of work. Her fourth novel, Rubbernecker, was voted Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. Her eighth novel, Snap, was a Sunday Times bestseller. It was longlisted for the Man Booker prize and voted Crime & Thriller Book of the Year at the Specsavers National Book Awards.

Her books have been translated into twenty-five languages.

portrait photo of Belinda Bauer

Also by Belinda Bauer

The Beautiful Dead
The Impossible Thing
Snap
Exit
Finders Keepers
Darkside
The Shut Eye
See all

Praise for Blacklands

[Belinda Bauer] is such an interesting writer - a restless intelligence that always goes its own way, but always comes up with something that feels both surprising but inevitable.

Lee Child

Blacklands... managed to glean the best word-of-mouth for any new crime novel in years.

BARRY FORSHAW, Independent (Best Books of 2010)

A chilling and gripping original thriller by a great new talent. You'll want to race through to the scary climax

Grazia

A compelling story of a fragmented family and the loss of innocence

Woman & Home

A gripping read

The Times

A psychological tour-de-force about the cruelty of hope and, ultimately, the triumph of innocence

Guardian

A tense, well-orchestrated crime novel with a refreshingly unusual premise

Spectator (Books of the Year)

A very special debut thriller, and a clear-eyed depiction of ordinary people under extraordinary stress. This is something quite new

ANN CLEEVES, bestselling author of the Vera and Shetland novels

An excellent first novel, with a highly original plot

The Times

Blacklands caused the hearts of hardened reviewers to flip a beat

Independent

Blacklands heralds a fresh new voice in crime: Belinda Bauer inhabits the mind of her 12-year-old hero, struggling to tease the whereabouts of his uncle's body from an imprisoned child-killer, with uncanny conviction

Guardian

Exceptional debut . . . A new UK crime writer to shout about

Bookseller (Alice O'Keeffe)

Extraordinarily powerful and provocative... will leave you breathless

Daily Mirror

In this atmospheric debut, Bauer ably paints a convincingly chilling portrait of a child killer, but it is her moving portrayal of a lonely, bullied child with a comfortless life that singles her out as an accomplished writer

Daily Mail

Original, unsettling and atmospheric, this is a debut that hits the ground running

VAL MCDERMID

The reader is fully gripped... Bauer's first novel shows an extraordinary power of imagination and, vital in crime fiction, the ability to create fear and empathy in the reader

Independent

Thought-provoking and utterly original

MO HAYDER