Hawthorn and Child

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A novel peppered with unnerving scenes of real, confused London life, the lives of functioning-but-marginal Londoners revealed in all their vulnerabilities and misapprehensions, with immense observational brilliance.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Publishers Weekly Review

The London we encounter in Ridgway's (Animals) unsettling new novel is a city of mystery, a cloud of fog which allows few glimpses of clarity-despite the many attempts at crime-solving made by the two police detective protagonists. The book reads like a collection of short stories, unified only by the continuing presence of the police partners, a crime lord named Mishazzo, and an atmosphere in which answers are always just out of reach. Characters, with varying levels of criminality, appear and disappear: a man shot by someone in a vintage car no one else witnesses; a potentially psychopathic editor who obsesses over a strange fantasy manuscript; a pickpocket; a daughter in the throes of her first sexual relationship. In spite of the book's general obscurity, two protagonists are fully realized, intriguing characters: exact opposites, one black, straight, good-looking, and secure; the other white, gay, and neurotic. Their appearance is always a welcome moment within each chapter. Ridgway's writing is beautiful, sardonic, and well-contained. A detective novel with many crimes and few solutions concerned more with human connection (or lack thereof) than cases and clues, Ridgway's book is successfully thought-provoking and haunting. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.