Henrietta Mckervey: Violet Hill

'Henrietta McKervey is a storyteller of rare gifts. Violet Hill is a wonderfully assured and compelling novel, so evocative of a London that has long ceased to be, yet crackling on every page with urgently contemporary resonance and meaning. I could not put it down.' Joseph O'Connor December 1918: Post-War London is grieving, the city a wound whose dressing was taken off too soon. Violet Hill, the only female private detective in the city, is hired by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's business manager to uncover spiritual trickery he believes is deceiving his employer. January 2018: Susanna is a super-recogniser, one of an elite Met Police team of officers with extraordinary powers for facial recognition. When a freak injury causes her unusual ability to suddenly disappear, a dangerous criminal whom she no longer recognises decides to close in. Compelling stories across two eras weave into this page-turning, literary adventure of identity, deception, danger - and detection. 'McKervey is a skilful, intelligent storyteller who looks at the world from fresh perspectives; she raises questions about the gap between appearance and reality, truth and fiction, surveillance and security that will stay with a reader long after they finish reading this novel.' Lia Mills