The Shining Girls. Lauren Beukes
Copyright
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
77–85 Fulham Palace Road
Hammersmith, London W6 8JB
www.harpercollins.co.uk
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2013
Copyright © Lauren Beukes 2013
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2013
Cover lettering © Craig Ward/www.wordsarepictures.co.uk
Cover photograph © Kate Polin/Millennium Images, UK
Lauren Beukes asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007464586
Ebook Edition © August 2013 ISBN: 9780007464630
Version: 2014-07-02
Praise for The Shining Girls
‘A powerful thriller – imaginative, disturbing, complex, tense, compelling reading’
The Times
‘I’m all over it’
Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl
‘Clever story, smart prose’
Stephen King
‘Engrossing as it is original, as rewarding as it is challenging – superb. A beautifully layered work of fiction. It becomes so much more, part social history, part sociopath – the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Take the time to read this, it’s mesmerizing’
Sun
‘Brilliant. It should be the book of the summer. Forget Gone Girl, now it’s all about The Shining Girls’
Observer, ‘Why We’re Watching’
‘Utterly original, beautifully written. This is something special’
Tana French, author of In The Woods
‘Extremely creepy’
Mail on Sunday (Must Reads)
‘Brilliant. A book about the duel of two fabulously-realized characters – The Shining Girls is a finely organized, ingenious triumph’
Independent
‘Disturbing, smart and beautifully written’
Erin Morgenstern, author of The Night Circus
‘This year’s must-read’
Stylist
‘Masterful … Very smart, wholly original, completely kick-ass’
William Gibson
‘A wild, brutal ride through the twentieth century, in the company of one of the sarkiest, most resilient heroines you're likely to meet this year’
Observer
‘A wonderful novel’
Joe Hill, author of Heart-Shaped Box
‘A dark tale, told inventively and full of surprises. Keep the lights on’
Daily Mail
‘Ingenious, imaginative and compulsively readable’
Sunday Mirror
‘A glorious creation. So pleased to read a serial killer thriller that has such intelligence behind it’
Granta
‘A killer of a novel with a brilliant mess-with-your-mind conclusion’
Marie Claire
‘A new kind of thriller. A dark, relentless, time-twisting, page-turning murder story. It shines’
Matt Haig, author of The Humans
‘An idea Stephen King probably wishes he’d thought of … Beukes can certainly shine herself’
Sunday Times
‘A tremendous work of suspense fiction. A mind-melting, heart-pounding mashup that delivers on its promise’
Cory Doctorow
‘Gone Girl has not exactly gone. But The Shining Girls have arrived’
The Times
‘Beukes neatly sidesteps the lazy sensationalism of some purveyors of the crime noir genre, deftly capturing the crucible of raw human emotion where life and death collide. The women she writes about are not victims in the true sense of the word. Each in her own way has railed against the conventions of her time – and Beukes celebrates them all’
Glasgow Herald
‘Strong contender for the role of this summer’s universal beach read – loaded with acrobatic twists and many gasp-worthy moments’
New York Times
‘The premise is pure Stephen King, but Beukes gives it an intricate, lyrical treatment all her own’
Time
‘This snappy thriller has got everyone talking – this summer’s answer to last year’s mega-hit Gone Girl’
New York Post (Book of the Summer)
‘Once you start reading, you will be hard-pressed to put down The Shining Girls’
CNN.com
‘The Shining Girls is one of the best serial killer tales ever. Gorgeously written and seriously disturbing. A must-read’
i09.com
For Matthew
Table of Contents