The Hidden [Paperback]

Hill's prose is always evocative, fresh and exact ... This dark and tense novel renders that experience of discovery and disillusionment with elegantly chilling skill. --TLS

one of the finest novels written so far about this, our age of terror. Hill doesn't write about al-Qaida v America or Islam v the west, but about something altogether subtler and more profound - extremism itself.

Poetic and menacing ... Hill keeps the tension building to a climax which features the most unpleasant final image I've come across in a long time. Quite brilliant.

well-executed page-turner ... The ingenious plot twists of The Hidden are satisfying to follow ... done with admirable intelligence. You don't often see writing a lively as this

From acclaimed author Tobias Hill, an extraordinary novel of ancient secrets, modern conflict and what it costs to belong.

Apart from everything else that this novel is - a beautifully paced thriller, a meditation on loss, guilt, obsession - it is also one of the finest novels written so far about this, our age of terror.

A wonderful novel: elegant yet savage, restrained yet full-throttled, illuminated by the sort of brilliance that leaves you short of breath.

'Quite Brilliant'

As good as it gets.

In Sparta, southern Greece, a close-knit group search for the buried traces of a formidable ancient power. A latecomer, Ben Mercer finds himself drawn to their brilliance and charisma: to the double-edged friendship of his countryman Jason, the unsettling beauty of the women, Natsuko and Eleschen, and the menace of Max and Eberhard, who idealise the extremes of the ancient Spartans.

Thrilled by the possibility of acceptance and excited by the dangerous games they play, Ben gradually wins his way into the circle. But there is more to the group than he understands, and Ben finds out too late that some things should remain hidden. He must decide where his loyalties lie -- before the decision is taken for him.

Written with astonishing grace and power, The Hidden is a novel about the secrets we keep, the ties that bind us and the true cost of fulfilling our desires.

Tobias Hill was born in London. In 2003 the TLS nominated him as one the best young writers in Britain: in 2004 he was selected as one of the country's Next Generation poets and shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year. His collection of stories, Skin, won the Pen-Macmillan Prize for Fiction and was shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys/Mail on Sunday Prize. The Cryptographer, his third novel, led AS Byatt to observe that 'Hill is one of the two or three most original and interesting young novelists working in Britain today.' His fourth novel, The Hidden, was published in 2009 to great critical acclaim.