A gritty thriller taking one investigator into the dark underbelly of organised crime in the heart of his hometown, perfect for fans of Mick Herron and Ian Rankin.

'This is a brutal, propulsive and very hard-boiled thriller that's Worrall's best book yet' Sun
'Blends literary flair with Mick Herron's knack for blindsiding the reader' The Times
'Another winner by a rising star of British espionage fiction' Telegraph
'An absorbing mixture of crime thriller and spy story' Daily Mail
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The Times Book of the Month

"What you've got to understand is that men like him are the aristocracy in here. The armed robbers and contract killers. They're a breed apart."

Darren Sinfield, the most notorious inmate at Lower Marston maximum-security prison, has gone over the wall and is thought to be holed up in nearby Avonford, a decaying town with a squalid underbelly.

The intelligence officer tasked with hunting him down, Declan Rennard, was an Avonford man himself back in the day. He used to know where the bodies are buried. Now he's in danger of becoming one of them.

To catch a criminal, Dec must enter his own dark history to engage in a twisted game of cat and mouse with a man who plays it better than anyone. But unearthing the past will lead him into some dangerous places - the brutal world of organised crime, the dirty secrets of the security establishment and all the stories Britain would rather forget...