The Young Accomplice

Britains answer to Donna TarttSunday Times

A huge talent Hilary Mantel

Was this how it was going to be for ever? Wrapping things for customers in womenswear, no conversation. Polishing the counters so her face reflected in the brass and sweeping floors at closing time until the boss said she could leave. How much worse off would she be if she went driving with a stranger for a while?

When sixteen-year-old Joyce Savigear absconds from work to go out with a man she barely knows, she hopes a new, exciting life is just beginning.

But, two years later, she is waiting on a railway station in the tranquil English countryside. Its the summer of 1952 and she and her younger brother Charlie have just been released from borstal. Another fresh start awaits - but can Joyce ever outrun the darkness of her past?

What a writer Richard Osman

An involving tale of revenge and responsibility, which, while it devastates, also tells us that new lives can be built among the ashesFT

The Young Accomplice shows the difference between a book that slides down the surface of things, and one that digs its claws into you and sticks thereThe Times