Darkside [Hardcover]

Bauer has shifted the boundaries of what makes a truly gripping, terrifying thriller. -- Daily Mirror

Bauer follows last year's storming debut, Blacklands, with Darkside. I would press this one on anyone who loves Kate Atkinson, Bauer really is that good... Another cracking crime novel. -- Bookseller

She's a thriller queen... hailed as the woman most likely to lead the fightback against the Scandinavian crime-wave...It's an extraordinary piece of writing... with a stunning denouement... one of the most gripping whodunnits you'll read in 2011
--Sunday Times

Outstandingly good... An unusually gripping tale --Literary Review

Tense and imaginative --Guardian

Belinda Bauer is the most disturbing new talent around -- VAL MCDERMID

Would you know a killer if you looked him in the eyes?

This is the sensational new crime novel from the author of Blacklands (2010 Crime Novel of the Year)

Shipcott in bleak mid-winter: a close knit community where no stranger goes unnoticed. So when an elderly woman is murdered in her bed, village policeman Jonas Holly is doubly shocked. How could someone have killed and left no trace?

Jonas finds himself sidelined as the investigation is snatched away from him by an abrasive senior detective. Is his first murder investigation over before it's begun?

But this isn't the end of it for Jonas, because someone in the village is taunting him, blaming him for the tragedy, and watching every move he makes...

Call yourself a policeman?

Jonas had always felt the local police held him in warm regard. Now a small dagger of ice had pierced that warmth and everything had changed in an instant.

Shipcott in bleak midwinter: a close-knit community where no stranger goes unnoticed. So when an elderly woman is murdered in her bed, village policeman Jonas Holly is doubly shocked. How could someone have entered, and killed, and left no trace?

Jonas finds himself sidelined as the investigation is snatched away from him by an abrasive senior detective. Is his first murder investigation over before it's begun?

But this isn't the end of it for Jonas, because someone in the village blames him for the tragedy. Someone seems to know every move he makes. Someone thinks he's not doing hisjob. And when the killer claims another vulnerable victim, these taunts turn into sinister threats.

Blinded by rising paranoia, relentless snow and fear for his own invalid wife, Jonas strikes out alone on a mystifying hunt. But the threats don't stop - and neither do the murders . . .

It is freezing mid-winter on Exmoor, and in a close-knit village where no stranger goes unnoticed, a local woman has been murdered in her bed.

This is local policeman Jonas Holly's first murder investigation. But he is distracted by an anonymous letter, accusing him of failing to do his job.

Taunted by the killer and sidelined by his abrasive senior detective, Jonas has no choice but to strike out alone on a terrifying hunt . . .

The question is, who is hunting who?

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Belinda Bauer lives in Wales. She has worked as a journalist and screenwriter and her script The Locker Room earned her the Carl Foreman/ Bafta Award for Young British Screenwriters. Her first novel Blacklands won the CWA Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel 2010.