Xwire in the Blood - Hardcover

Mcdermid Val

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0261672819 ISBN 13: 9780261672819

Publisher: Harper Collins Promotion, 1999

Synopsis

Val McDermid’s Number One bestselling crime series, featuring psychological profiler Dr Tony Hill and Jacko Vance – protagonist of new novel THE RETRIBUTION – in the suspenseful and ferociously readable thriller that led to the much-loved TV show.

Young girls are disappearing around the country, and there is nothing to connect them to one another, let alone the killer whose charming manner hides a warped and sick mind.

Dr Tony Hill, head of the new National Profiling Task Force, sets his team an exercise: they are given the details of missing teenagers and asked to discover any possible links between the cases. Only one officer comes up with a theory – a theory that is ridiculed by the group ... until one of their number is murdered and mutilated.

For Tony Hill, the murder becomes a matter for personal revenge and, joined by colleague Carol Jordan, he embarks on a campaign of psychological terrorism – a game where hunter and hunted can all too easily be reversed.

About this title

Review:

'The book [has] a sense of gravitas and intelligence utterly beyond lesser writers in the field ... This is a wholly satisfying read which cleverly subverts tradition and expectation’ Ian Rankin, Scotland on Sunday

'This is a shocking book, stunningly exciting, horrifyingly good. It is so convincing that one fears reality may be like this and these events the awful truth' Ruth Rendell

'The Wire in the Blood is truly frightening, McDermid's capacity to enter the warped mind of a deviant criminal is shiveringly convincing ... Tony Hill, driven and disturbed, is an appealing and original character. This is a writer who just gets better and better' The Times

'Terrific chiller from Manchester's answer to Thomas Harris ... Thank God for Tony Hill and psychological profiling' Guardian

'Val McDermid is an accomplished storyteller, and this scary, fast-moving tale is engrossing' Daily Telegraph

From the Back Cover:

Young girls are disappearing around the country. Everyone assumes they are teenage runaways, headed for the big city and bright lights. They vanish without trace – society’s disposable children. There is nothing to connect them to each other, let alone the killer whose charming manner hides a warped and sick mind.

Nobody moves around inside the messy heads of serial killers like Dr Tony Hill. Now heading up the recently founded National Profiling Task Force, he sets his team an exercise: they are given the details of thirty missing teenagers and asked to use their new techniques to discover whether there is a sinister link between any of the cases. Only one officer, Shaz Bowman, comes up with a concrete theory, but it is ridiculed by the rest of her group ... until a killer murders and mutilates one of their number.

Could Bowman’s outrageous suspicion possibly be true? For Tony Hill, the murder of a member of his team becomes a matter for personal revenge. Aided by his previous colleague, Carol Jordan, he embarks upon a campaign of psychological terrorism – a game of cat and mouse where the roles of hunter and hunted are all too easily reversed.

Taut, suspenseful and shocking, 'The Wire in the Blood' is a ferociously readable thriller from one of Britain’s leading young novelists.

Val McDermid grew up in a Scottish mining community then read English at Oxford. She was a journalist for sixteen years, spending the last three years as Northern Bureau Chief of a national Sunday tabloid. She is now a full time writer and lives in south Manchester.

Val McDermid has written five crime novels featuring Kate Brannigan, the third of which, 'Crack Down', was shortlisted for the CWA’s Gold Dagger Award and the Anthony Award. She has also written a non fiction book, 'A Suitable Job for a Woman', lifting the lid on the world of female private detectives, and five novels featuring journalist sleuth Lindsay Gordon.

'The Mermaids Singing', which introduced clinical psychologist Tony Hill, won the 1995 CWA Gold Dagger Award for Best Crime Novel of the Year.

ACCLAIM FOR
THE MERMAIDS SINGING

“Compelling and shocking”
MINETTE WALTERS

“Terrifying but stylish, cruel and compassionate”
MAIL ON SUNDAY

“Gripping, intelligent stuff”
THE TIMES

“A superb psychological thriller”
COSMOPOLITAN

“Think of psychological profiling and TV’s 'Cracker' springs to mind, but McDermid’s latest thriller goes one better ... a must for all crime fiction lovers”
COMPANY

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Collins Promotion
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0261672819
• ISBN 13: 9780261672819
• Binding: Hardcover