The Broken Ones

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Hachette Australia, Aug 29, 2011 - Fiction - 400 pages
By the creator and writer of the hit TV show SECRETS & LIES, the chilling story of Oscar Mariani, a detective who must face his own ghosts if he is to stop a brutal killer creating more...

'Gothic, gripping and genuinely scary...one to read late into the night.' Who Weekly

No one is safe. The world has descended into chaos. On the surface, everything looks the same - yet the unthinkable has happened. The dead have risen...

Everyone is haunted by a relative, friend, spouse or stranger and these spirits are unshakeable, silent and watching. Governments the world over fail to deal with the epidemic. Crime is rife and murders commonplace. But who is responsible: the ghosts or the people?

Finding out is where Detective Oscar Mariani comes in, although it's nearly impossible to run a department when you can't even see half the suspects. His strike rate is embarrassingly low.

Then he stumbles onto a case that cuts through his apathy. A ritualistic, brutal serial killer is at work murdering young women, and the evidence implicates those in high places. If Mariani can solve the case, and keep himself alive, he may be able to exorcise his own ghostly shadow, a dead young man who just might have a message Mariani needs to hear.

A gripping mix of police procedural and supernational thriller, The Broken Ones is a knuckle-whitening ride.

'The writing is at once witty, gritty and grim. The horrors are genuinely horrible and the imagined scenario is satisfyingly rich and suggestive.' Pick of the Week, Sydney Morning Herald

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About the author (2011)

Stephen M Irwin is an award-winning author and screenwriter. His debut novel THE DEAD PATH was named Top Horror Title in the American Library Association's RUSA 2011 reading list and won the Book-of-the-Month® Club 2010 First Fiction Award. It was described by the The Irish Examiner as 'A riveting, masterful debut'. THE BROKEN ONES, his second book was called 'Tautly plotted and acutely visual' by The Sydney Morning Herald. He is the writer and creator of the hit television show SECRETS & LIES.

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