Black Water

Review Beautifully written but at times disconcertingly dark, this is a good one for sitting out flight delays. ― Stylist [A]n intelligent thriller so full of shadows that it prickles with the anticipatory tension of a violent storm on a muggy day. ― Metro Doughty at her suspenseful best, working on a totally different canvas ... Doughty writes superbly about ... sexual passion as a force for change and possible redemption, when the stakes couldn't be higher. A forgotten part of Indonesia's turbulent history is well evoked. -- Kate Saunders ― The Times Ruthless and ambitious ... a truly gripping read, centering on themes of morality, race and judgement. ― Press Association Powerful, probing fiction in the tradition of Graham Greene and John le Carr�. ― Kirkus Doughty's language is punchy, visually striking and emotionally potent ... This is a compelling and vivid psychological drama, with plenty of bite. -- Leyla Sanai ― Guardian The set pieces are done with an almost P.M. Hubbard-like ability to unsettle, and there are domestic scenes, often heavy with significance, that are so well rendered that they approach the comic ... This is a book for Graham Greene and John le Carr� lovers, misanthropes often, who delight in extreme moral quandary. ― Spectator Product Description FROM THE WRITER OF BBC SMASH HIT DRAMA CROSSFIRE John Harper lies awake at night in an isolated hut on an Indonesian island, listening to the rain on the roof and believing his life may be in danger. But he is less afraid of what is going to happen than of something he's already done. In a local town, he meets Rita, a woman with her own troubled history. They begin an affair - but can he allow himself to get involved when he knows this might put her at risk? Moving between Europe during the cold war, California and the Civil Rights struggle, and Indonesia during the massacres of 1965 and the decades of military dictatorship that follow, Black Water is an epic novel that explores some of the darkest events of recent world history through the story of one troubled man. Black Water confirms Louise Doughty's position as one of our most important contemporary novelists. She writes with fierce intelligence and a fine-tuned sense of moral ambiguity that makes her fiction resonate in the reader's mind long after the final page has been turned. Book Description 'Black Water will delight fans of Graham Greene and John le Carre' Spectator About the Author Louise Doughty is the author of nine novels, including Platform Seven, Black Water, Apple Tree Yard, which was a top 10 bestseller in UK and Ireland and shortlisted for the CWA Steel Dagger Award and the National Book Awards Thriller of the Year, and Whatever You Love, which was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. She has also won awards for radio drama and short stories, along with publishing one work of non-fiction, A Novel in a Year, based on her hugely popular newspaper column. She is a critic and cultural commentator for UK and international newspapers and broadcasts regularly for the BBC. She is a former judge of the Man Booker Prize and the Costa Novel Prize and was Chair of Judges for the Desmond Elliot Award.