The Paper Cell
From the publisher of Graeme Macrae Burnet’s His Bloody Project, The Paper Cell is the first in a new series of distinctive, standalone crime stories, each with a literary bent.
In 1950s London, a literary agent finds fame when he secretly steals a young woman’s brilliant novel manuscript and publishes it under his own name, Lewis Carson. Two days after their meeting, the woman is found strangled on Peckham Rye Common: did Lewis purloin the manuscript as an act of callous opportunism, or as the spoils of a calculated murder?
REVIEWS OF The Paper Cell
"A lovely little book… [Its] strength is in the build-up, and it is really a character study of those involved – and a study of how they unravel afterwards over time.” Blue Book Balloon
“A fascinating narrative exploring guilt, secrecy and the impact of lifestyle choices in a very different 1950s society… A modern-day Charles Dickens meets Agatha Christie with a little twist of Oscar Wilde thrown in to spice it up!” Chapter in My Life
“There is betrayal, bitchiness, cruelty, debauchery, and that’s before there is any suggestion of death. From lust to pride and back again, all the deadly sins are present and correct. The characters are mostly beyond redemption, which of course makes them utterly captivating…Literate, literary, thoughtful and thoroughly entertaining.” Scots Whay Hae
“An unexpected joy … I loved the 1950s setting, that it was about writers, and the complex gay love story.” Kirsty Logan