APRIL 2022 - JANUARY 2023 - NEW BOOKS AND BACKLIST - | VERVE BOOKS
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A P R I L 2 0 2 2 – JA N UA RY 2 0 23
N E W B O O KS A N D B AC K L I S T
1Launched in 2018, VERVE Books is an independent publisher of
page-turning, diverse and original fiction. The list is tightly curated
and open to all genres, although the books are connected by rich,
story-driven narratives and memorable characters. VERVE is a separate
entity but run in parallel with Oldcastle Books, whose imprints include
the award-winning crime fiction list No Exit Press.
a @Verve_Books b fb.com/vervebooks x @Verve_Books @Verve_Books
vervebooks.co.uk
2THE DISTANT DEAD
HEATHER YOUNG Author of The Lost Girls
A BODY BURNS IN THE DESERT...
DOES THE BOY WHO FOUND IT KNOW
MORE THAN IT SEEMS?
Sal Prentiss, orphaned and burdened with a terrible secret,
just wants a place to belong. Sal lives with his uncles on a
desolate ranch in the hills, and finds himself at the centre of
a brutal murder investigation when he discovers the body of
his maths teacher, charred almost beyond recognition, half
a mile from his uncles’ compound.
In the seven months Adam Merkel taught maths at Lovelock’s
middle school, the quiet and seemingly unremarkable teacher
had formed a bond with Sal, and was one of the few people
to look out for the boy.
Nora Wheaton, the school’s social studies teacher, sensed a
kindred spirit in Adam – another soul bound to Lovelock by
guilt and duty. After his death, she delves into his past for
clues to who killed him. For Sal’s grief seems shaded with
fear, and Nora suspects he knows more than he’s telling
about his teacher’s death.
‘Stunning... an ideal recommendation for fans of
Kate Atkinson and Jodi Picoult’ – BOOKLIST
‘Powerful and poignant’ – PEOPLE
HEATHER YOUNG is the author
of two novels. Her debut, The Lost Girls ,
APRIL 2022 vervebooks.co.uk/the-distant-dead
won the Strand Award for Best First
PBO 978-0-85730-814-6 £9.99 Novel and was nominated for an Edgar
FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) // PAGE EXTENT 352pp Award. The Distant Dead was named
EB (available now) 978-0-85730-815-3 £4.99 one of the Best Books of Summer
CATEGORY Thriller // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada 2020 by People Magazine, Parade,
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft and CrimeReads . A former antitrust
OTHER PUBLISHERS HarperCollins – US & Canada and intellectual property litigator,
she traded the legal world for the
literary one and earned her MFA from
the Bennington Writing Seminars in
2011. She lives in Mill Valley, California,
where she writes, bikes, hikes, and
reads books by other people that she
wishes she’d written.
heatheryoungwriter.com
@HYoungwriter
3PRAISE FOR IMPOSTOR SYNDROME
‘A wickedly convincing deep-dive into the dark underbelly of Silicon Valley’
– RUTH WARE, internationally bestselling author
‘A skilled satirist’
– HARPER’S BAZAAR
‘A smart page-turner’
– OPRAH DAILY
‘A sharp take on the illusion of the American dream’
– PEOPLE MAGAZINE
‘Impostor Syndrome, like its two heroines, wears its greatness lightly’
– NEW REPUBLIC
‘This book is an impeccably-plotted and snarky page-turner, and its portrayal of
Silicon Valley is so accurate that I laughed out loud... Impostor Syndrome
will hook you in until the very last page’
– SUSIE YANG, New York Times bestselling author of White Ivy
‘Impostor Syndrome encapsulates our Facebook anxieties perfectly’
– THE MILLIONS
‘The Silicon Valley spy novel we’ve all been waiting for,
with a side order of biting satire and furious feminism’
– CRIMEREADS
‘Satisfying... Wang sets the story in the overheated Silicon Valley
and sharpens her teeth on its self-mythologizing and excesses’
– SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
‘Electrifying... you’ll be glued to the pages the entire time’
– THE SKIMM
‘Excellent… Wang deftly explores some of the broader cultural issues
she broached in Family Trust as well – how women and BIPOC are treated
in corporate America, and who has access to the American dream’
– BUZZFEED
4IMPOSTOR SYNDROME
KATHY WANG
Silicon Valley meets Killing Eve in this highly
anticipated, razor-sharp novel about women in
the workplace, the power of Big Tech and the
looming threat of foreign espionage.
Julia Lerner is one of the most powerful people in Silicon
Valley and an icon to professional women across the country.
She is the COO of Tangerine, one of America’s biggest
technology companies. She is also a Russian spy. Julia has
been carefully groomed to reach the upper echelons of the
company and use Tangerine’s software to covertly funnel
information back to Russia’s largest intelligence agency.
Alice Lu works as a low-level analyst within Tangerine, having
never quite managed to climb the corporate ladder. One
afternoon, when performing a server check, Alice discovers
some unusual activity and is burdened with two powerful
but distressing suspicions: Tangerine’s privacy settings aren’t
as rigorous as the company claims they are and the person
abusing this loophole might be Julia Lerner herself. Now, she
must decide what to do with this information – before Julia
finds out she has it.
A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BUZZ PICK
NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE
YEAR BY THE MILLIONS , HARPER’S BAZAAR ,
MARIE CLAIRE AND CRIMEREADS
phot
o: Nina S ub
in
KATHY WANG grew up in Northern
MAY 2022 vervebooks.co.uk/impostor-syndrome California and holds degrees from UC
Berkeley and Harvard Business School.
PBO 978-0-85730-824-5 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) She lives in the Bay Area with her
PAGE EXTENT 320pp // EB 978-0-85730-825-2 £4.99 husband and two children.
CATEGORY Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada, ANZ
AUDIO rights available // OTHER PUBLISHERS HarperCollins – bykathywang.com
US & Canada // AUTHOR LOCATION San Francisco, USA @bykathywang
5PRAISE FOR STARGAZER
‘Stargazer is a dark and dreamlike journey into the obsession, envy and love
between two young friends in the 90s. The tension simmers in this atmospheric
lake-side setting until the crushing end. Laurie Petrou’s writing is melodic and
immersive. A delicious read!’
– ASHLEY AUDRAIN, New York Times bestselling author of The Push
‘These women will haunt you’
– GIN PHILLIPS, bestselling author of The Well and the Mine
‘A sinuous, captivating exploration of the mysterious depths of female friendship
that had me hooked from its first pages… This unforgettable novel from a truly
talented novelist is perfect for fans of Celeste Ng’
– MARISSA STAPLEY, bestselling author of Lucky and The Last Resort
‘An outstanding book with some of the most beautiful lines I’ve ever read’
– SAMANTHA M. BAILEY, bestselling author of Woman on the Edge
‘Stargazer is a galaxy of a novel: at once a story of friendship, a coming-of-age,
and a dark and utterly captivating tale of family, lust, loss, fame, art and the ever
competing hope and destructiveness of youth’
– AMY STUART, bestselling author of Still Mine
‘A slow-burn literary thriller in the best possible way: eerie, beautiful,
and impossible to put down. I loved it’
– ROBYN HARDING, bestselling author of The Perfect Family
6STARGAZER
LAURIE PETROU
IT’S A FINE LINE BETWEEN
ADMIRATION AND ENVY.
Diana Martin has lived her life in the shadow of her sadistic
older brother. She quietly watches the family next door,
enthralled by celebrity fashion designer Marianne Taylor
and her feted daughter, Aurelle.
She wishes she were a ‘Taylor girl’.
By the summer of 1995, the two girls are at university
together, bonded by a mutual desire to escape their wealthy
families and personal tragedies and forge new identities.
They are closer than lovers, intoxicated by their own bond,
falling into the hedonistic seduction of the woods and the
water at a remote university that is more summer camp
than campus.
But when burgeoning artist Diana has a chance at fame,
cracks start to appear in their friendship. To what lengths is
Diana willing to go to secure her own stardom?
ph
ot
o: K
at Kee
nan P ho
JUNE 2022 vervebooks.co.uk/stargazer
tog
PBO 978-0-85730-822-1 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm)
ra
p
hy
PAGE EXTENT 256pp // EB 978-0-85730-823-8 £4.99
CATEGORY Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada // AUDIO
EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION Ontario, Canada LAURIE PETROU is an award-
winning author, and Associate
Professor at the RTA School of Media
at X (Ryerson) University in Toronto.
She is a voracious reader and has been
writing stories her whole life. She lives
Also by LAURIE PETROU in Niagara with her family, two cats
and a dog. Stargazer is her fourth book.
SISTER OF MINE
PB 978-0-85730-339-4 £9.99 lauriepetrou.com
EB 978-0-85730-340-0 £4.99 @lauriepetrou
7PRAISE FOR THE VERY NICE BOX
‘Blackett and Gleichman are linguistic magicians, and their
sparkling debut manages to expose the hollowness of well-being
jargon while exploring, with tender care and precision,
how we dare to move on after unspeakable loss’
– NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
‘A very funny debut - and perhaps the most original office
satire of the year... There’s no way to put The Very Nice Box into,
well, a box. It’s a parody that feels like an extended inside joke;
it’s a thriller, a romance and a quirky coming-of-age saga’
– WASHINGTON POST
‘Rather than boxing in queerness, the authors suggest queerness
as a lens for seeing, reading, and, arguably, for their own storytelling,
which refuses trite or stereotypical generic moments. The story charms,
it entices, and it keeps the reader in their hands, wanting more’
– LOS ANGELES REVIEW OF BOOKS
‘A fascinating look at the ways people choose to compartmentalize grief.
The writing is sharp and dynamic, the plot wonderfully compelling.
It’s a very fun read, but it’s also a timely one: how does toxic masculinity
in corporate culture restructure and rebrand itself in order to appear
innocuous? The Very Nice Box is a very nice book, and Blackett and
Gleichman have created something stellar here’
– KRISTEN ARNETT, author of With Teeth
‘The quirky personality of Ava, the protagonist in this tale,
is reminiscent of Eleanor Oliphant’
– BEYOND THE BOOKENDS
‘Compelling, quirky, and different… In a darkly funny, thought-provoking,
and twisty novel, readers will be entertained and root for Ava, and for
a life where grief and hope can coexist’
– SHONDALAND
‘Blackett and Gleichman are particularly good at describing
the cultish nature of millennial workplace culture by exposing
the hollow roots of toxic wellness jargon… [A] literary
accomplishment that some might call genre-bending,
but I’m choosing to simply call fantastic engineering’
– BITCH MEDIA
8THE VERY NICE BOX
LAURA BLACKETT AND EVE GLEICHMAN
Ava Simon designs storage boxes for STÄDA, a slick
Brooklyn-based furniture company. She’s hard-working,
obsessive and heartbroken from a tragedy that killed her
girlfriend and upended her life. It’s been years since she’s
let anyone in.
But when Ava’s new boss – the young and magnetic Mat
Putnam – offers Ava a ride home one afternoon, an unlikely
relationship blossoms. Ava remembers how rewarding it
can be to open up – and, despite her hesitancy, she starts to
fall for him. But what if she can’t put her trust in Mat?
The Very Nice Box is a darkly comic and suspenseful novel
that will keep you on the edge of your seat until its gripping
finale. It’s at once a satire of toxic masculinity and a big-
hearted account of grief, friendship and trust.
SELECTED AS A NEW YORK TIMES
EDITORS’ CHOICE
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF JULY 2021 IN
THE US BY APPLE BOOKS, SHONDALAND
AND BUSTLE AND ONE OF LGBTQ READS
‘MOST ANTICIPATED’ BOOKS
pho
to: J ana L a B r a s
ca
EVE GLEICHMAN AND
LAURA BLACKETT are
neighbours and writing partners
based in Brooklyn, New York. Eve
is a fiction-writer with work in The
Kenyon Review, The Harvard Review
and BOMB Magazine, and is a graduate
JULY 2022 vervebooks.co.uk/the-very-nice-box of Brooklyn College’s fiction MFA
program. Laura is a woodworker and
PBO 978-0-85730-826-9 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) writer. The Very Nice Box is their
PAGE EXTENT 320pp // EB (available now) 978-0-85730-827-6 debut novel.
£4.99 // CATEGORY Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // OTHER PUBLISHERS HMH Books – eveandlaura.work
US & Canada // AUTHORS LOCATION Brooklyn, USA @egleichman
9MAD, BAD AND DEAD
BOOK 3 IN THE JUDI WESTERHOLME SERIES
SHERRYL CLARK
A DEAD EMPLOYEE. A MISSING CHILD.
ANONYMOUS PHONE CALLS IN THE DEAD
OF NIGHT. JUDI WESTERHOLME’S TROUBLES
AREN’T OVER YET...
Already struggling to juggle co-running the local pub with
her childcare responsibilities for her orphaned niece, Judi
does not need life to become any more complicated.
Yet, as usual, complications arrive in spades: she starts
receiving threatening, late-night phone calls before
discovering one of her employees, Kate, shot dead.
Judi finds herself caught up in a murder investigation, as
well as the hunt for the Kate’s fourteen-year-old daughter,
who has been missing since the murder.
Add in the uncertainty of her relationship with Melbourne-
based DS Heath and the fact that her estranged mother’s
nursing home keeps urging her to visit, and Judi might
finally be at breaking point.
A fast-paced thriller set in rural Australia, Mad, Bad and Dead
is perfect for fans of BBC One’s The Tourist.
AUGUST 2022 vervebooks.co.uk/mad-bad-and-dead
PBO 978-0-85730-820-7 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) SHERRYL CLARK has had
PAGE EXTENT 320pp // EB 978-0-85730-821-4 £4.99 40 children’s and YA books published
CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS World in Australia, and several in the US and
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION New Zealand UK, plus collections of poetry and four
verse novels. She has taught writing
at Holmesglen TAFE and Victoria
University. She recently completed
a Master of Fine Arts program at
Hamline University, Minnesota, and
is now studying for a PhD in creative
writing.
sherrylclarkcrimewriter.com
@sherrylwriter
10VERA KELLY
LOST AND FOUND
BOOK 3 IN THE VERA KELLY SERIES
ROSALIE KNECHT
Spring 1971. Vera Kelly and her girlfriend, Max, leave
their cosy Brooklyn apartment for an emergency visit to
Max’s estranged family in Los Angeles. Max’s parents are
divorcing – her father is already engaged to a much younger
woman and under the sway of an occultist charlatan; her
mother has left their estate in a hurry with no indication of
return. Max, who hasn’t seen her family since they threw
her out at twenty-one, prepares for the trip with equal parts
dread and anger.
Upon arriving, Vera is shocked by the size and extravagance
of the family estate which reveals a privileged upbringing
that, up until this point, Max had only hinted at. Tensions
boil over at dinner as Max attempts to navigate her father,
who is hostile and controlling, and the occultist, St James,
who is charming but appears to be siphoning family money.
The next morning, when Vera wakes up, Max is gone…
‘Vera, outwardly cool but inwardly seething, makes
for great company. Rosalie Knecht – proving it can be
done – has created something truly original’
– TIMES & SUNDAY TIMES CRIME CLUB
SEPTEMBER 2022
pho
vervebooks.co.uk/vera-kelly-lost-and-found
t o : S ez e D e v r e
PBO 978-0-85730-828-3 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm)
PAGE EXTENT 224pp // EB (June 2022) 978-0-85730-829-0 £4.99
s
CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // OTHER PUBLISHERS Tin House –
US & Canada // AUTHOR LOCATION New Jersey, USA
ROSALIE KNECHT is the author
of Who Is Vera Kelly?, Vera Kelly
Is Not A Mystery, Vera Kelly Lost
and Found and Relief Map. She is
also the translator of César Aira’s
The Seamstress and the Wind .
She lives in New Jersey.
rosalieknecht.net
@RosalieKnecht
11THE DAZZLE OF
THE LIGHT
GEORGINA CLARKE
A sparkling new historical novel set in the
1920s, inspired by the notorious all-female
crime syndicate known as the Forty Thieves who
operated out of the slums of south London.
Ruby Mills is ruthlessly ambitious, strikingly beautiful –
and one of the Forty Thieves’ most talented members.
photo: Anastasia Jobson
Harriet Littlemore writes the women’s section in a local
newspaper. She’s from a ‘good’ London family and engaged
to an up-and-coming Member of Parliament – but she
wants a successful career of her own.
After witnessing Ruby fleeing the scene of a robbery,
Harriet develops a fascination with the elusive young thief
that extends beyond journalistic interest. As their personal
aspirations bring them into closer contact than society’s
rules usually allow, Ruby and Harriet’s stories become
increasingly intertwined.
Their magnetic dynamic, fraught with envy and desire, tells
a compulsive, cinematic story about class, morality and the
cost of being an independent woman in 1920s London.
GEORGINA CLARKE has a
degree in theology and completed
a PhD in history part-time, while
working as a parish priest. Her love
of the past is at the heart of her
fiction: her Lizzie Hardwicke crime
series (published by Canelo) is set
in the mid-eighteenth century, and
her latest novel – The Dazzle of the
Light – unfolds in 1920s London and is
inspired by the real-life activities of
the women-led Forty Thieves crime
syndicate. In 2021, Georgina began
working as a tutor at The Queen’s
Foundation in Birmingham, training
clergy. When she’s not working, she
NOVEMBER 2022 enjoys dressmaking, running and
vervebooks.co.uk/the-dazzle-of-the-light mooching around old houses. She lives
in Worcester with her husband, son
PBO 978-0-85730-830-6 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) and two lively cats.
PAGE EXTENT TBC // EB 978-0-85730-831-3 £4.99
CATEGORY Historical Crime Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex georginaclarkeauthor.com
Canada // AUTHOR LOCATION Worcester, UK @clarkegeorgina1
12WISH YOU WERE HERE
BOOK 2 IN THE DR SIAN LOVE SERIES
NICOLA MONAGHAN
DNA DOESN’T LIE. BUT WHAT IF
THE TRUTH IS DANGEROUS?
Former police officer and DNA expert Dr Sian Love
has settled into running her own detective agency and
cohabiting with her partner, Kris. Her life is thrown into
chaos once again when a teenage girl shows up at her office,
claiming to be Courtney Johnson – a child who went
missing in Nottingham over fifteen years ago – but refusing
to allow Sian to test her DNA.
Wary but intrigued, Sian reluctantly revives the undercover
skills she learned in her days in the police force and begins
investigating. But when revisiting the past, Sian comes
up against more powerful obstacles than she could have
imagined – and a moral dilemma that may be even harder
to overcome...
Wish You Were Here is a suspenseful, gritty crime thriller with
timely British cultural issues at its core, perfect for fans of
Kate Atkinson’s Case Histories and crime dramas The Bay
and Unforgotten.
NICOLA MONAGHAN has lived
and worked in London, Paris, Chicago
and New York but returned to her
home town of Nottingham in 2002 to
pursue a masters in Creative Writing.
DECEMBER 2022 She graduated from Nottingham Trent
vervebooks.co.uk/wish-you-were-here University in 2004 with a distinction,
and went on to write her first novel,
PBO 978-0-85730-808-5 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) The Killing Jar, set on the council
PAGE EXTENT TBC // EB 978-0-85730-809-2 £4.99 estate where she lived as a child. This
CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS World critically-acclaimed debut novel won
AUDIO EDITION W F Howes // AUTHOR LOCATION Nottingham, UK a Betty Trask Award, the Authors’
Club Best First Novel Prize and the
Waverton Good Read. Nicola has
written several other novels, novellas
and a collection of short stories. She
also teaches Creative Writing at De
Montfort University, and online at
YouTube, Udemy and Skillshare.
nicolamonaghan.com
@nicolanovelist
13FEAR AND LOVELY
ANJANA APPACHANA
A vibrant, wholly original novel about identity,
family and the complexities of human emotion,
set in 1970s India.
Mallika is a painfully shy young woman growing up in
the heart of a close-knit, sometimes stifling New Delhi
colony. Though she is surrounded by love, Mallika’s life is
complicated by secrets that she, her mother and her aunt
work hard to keep.
photo: Malvika A. Sinha
When she suffers a trauma aged nineteen that causes her to
lose three days of her memory and slowly spiral into a deep
depression, Mallika must find a way out of this abyss, back
to herself and those she cares about. But she must also hide
her mental illness from her community.
In a narrative that unfolds elliptically from the perspectives
of Mallika and the seven people closest to her, the astonishing
story of these characters’ intertwining lives emerges. For
Mallika’s family, childhood friends and the two men she loves
are also hiding truths. As each gives voice to contending with
their own struggles, secrets and silences shatter.
As irreverent and funny as it is serious and anguished, Fear ANJANA APPACHANA was
and Lovely is a tender, character-driven story of love, longing, born and educated in India, where
terror and healing that will keep you turning pages, and won’t she did her BA (Hons) in English
let you go. at Delhi University and her MA in
Sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru
University. After working in India
for a few years she went on to do
her MFA in Creative Writing at Penn
State. Subsequently, she has been
living both in the US and in India.
Appachana’s book, Incantations
& Other Stories , was published in
the UK, India, the US, Germany and
France, and her novel Listening
Now, in the US, India and France. Her
short stories have been published
in various journals, anthologies and
magazines. Appachana is a recipient
JANUARY 2023 vervebooks.co.uk/fear-and-lovely of the National Endowment of the Arts
Creative Writing Fellowship and an
PBO 978-0-85730-832-0 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) O. Henry Festival prize.
PAGE EXTENT TBC // EB 978-0-85730-833-7 £4.99
CATEGORY Fiction // RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada vervebooks.co.uk/anjana-
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION Arizona, USA appachana
14RECENT HIGHLIGHT…
Launch of a new British crime series
ON THE EDGE
BOOK 1 IN THE JEN SHAW SERIES
Book 2 to follow in 2023.
JANE JESMOND
A fast-paced, contemporary mystery-thriller set
in Cornwall with echoes of Daphne du Maurier.
Jen Shaw has climbed all her life: daring ascents of sheer
rock faces, crumbling buildings, cranes - the riskier the
better. Both her work and personal life revolved around
climbing, and the adrenaline high it gave her. Until she went
too far and hurt the people she cares about. So she’s given it
all up now. Honestly, she has. And she’s checked herself into
a rehab centre to prove it.
Yet, when Jen awakens to find herself drugged and dangling
off the local lighthouse during a wild storm less than twenty-
four hours after a ‘family emergency’ takes her home to
Cornwall, she needs all her skill to battle her way to safety.
Has Jen fallen back into her old risky ways, or is there a more
sinister explanation hidden in her hometown? Only when
she has navigated her fragmented memories and faced
her troubled past will she be able to piece together what On The Edge is JANE JESMOND ’s
happened – and trust herself to fix it. debut novel and the first in a series
featuring dynamic, daredevil
protagonist Jen Shaw. Although she
SELECTED AS A SUNDAY TIMES
was born in Newcastle upon Tyne,
CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH.
raised in Liverpool and considers
herself northern through and through,
‘Intriguing… the landscape of Cornwall, with its history Jane’s family comes from Cornwall. Her
of smuggling, makes a suitably mysterious backdrop’ lifelong love of the Cornish landscape
– HERALD and culture inspired the setting of
On The Edge. Jane has spent the last
‘Jesmond explores the adrenaline rush of risky sports in thirty years living and working in
this original mystery... a promising debut’ France. She began writing steadily six
or seven years ago and writes every
– SUNDAY TIMES
morning in between staring out at the
sea and making cups of tea. She also
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/on-the-edge enjoys reading, walking and amateur
dramatics and, unlike her daredevil
PBO 978-0-85730-816-0 £9.99 // FORMAT B (198 x 129mm) protagonist, is terrified of heights!
PAGE EXTENT 320pp // EB 978-0-85730-817-7 £4.99
CATEGORY Mystery/Thriller // RIGHTS World // AUDIO EDITION jane-jesmond.com
Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION Le Conquet, France @AuthorJJesmond
15TRUST ME, I’M DEAD
BOOK 1 IN THE JUDI WESTERHOLME SERIES
SHERRYL CLARK
SHE HASN’T SEEN HER BROTHER IN YEARS.
NOW, HE’S DEAD.
When Judi Westerholme finds out her estranged brother has
been murdered, she assumes it’s connected to his long term
drug addiction. Returning home, she is shocked to discover
he had been clean for years, had a wife – now missing –
a child and led a respectable life. But if he had turned his
life around, why was he killed in a drug deal shooting? And
where is his wife?
Desperate to know what really happened, Judi sets out to
uncover the truth, even though it means confronting her
own traumatic past. But she’s not the only one looking for
answers... LONGLISTED FOR
She turned her back on her brother before. Should she trust THE CWA JOHN CREASEY
him now? DAGGER, THE DAVITT AWARD
FOR ADULT CRIME NOVEL &
THE NGAIO MARSH AWARD
‘Sherryl Clark is a worthy addition to the crime
writing fraternity, and Trust Me, I’m Dead is a book
you should definitely add to your reading list’
– SHOTS MAG
‘This novel is a page turner and the action is pretty
much full on; kidnap, murder, gangster wars,
a mcguffin and a decent cop’
– NB MAGAZINE
‘Gripping and disturbing... Trust Me, I’m Dead will
linger in your mind after you have read it’
– LEIGH RUSSELL
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/trust-me-im-dead
PBO 978-0-85730-804-7 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-805-4 £4.99 // CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS World
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION New Zealand
16DEAD AND GONE
BOOK 2 IN THE JUDI WESTERHOLME SERIES
SHERRYL CLARK
THERE’S NOTHING MORE DANGEROUS
THAN REVENGE.
Judi Westerholme has been through it. Brave and strong-
willed, she’s just about coping in her new role as foster parent
to her orphaned niece, taking a job at the local pub to help
make ends meet. Then the pub’s landlord and Judi’s friend,
army veteran Pete ‘Macca’ Maccasfield, is murdered, and her
world is suddenly turned upside down.
Despite warnings from the city police to keep out of it, Judi
can’t help but get involved in the search for Macca’s killer.
But she soon becomes deeply entangled with some ruthlessly
dangerous men. She must act fast and think smart to work
out what they want - before anyone else gets hurt...
Long buried secrets resurface in Sherryl Clark’s pacey crime
novel that pushes Judi Westerholme to her limits to protect
the people she loves most.
‘Relatable, plain-speaking characters and
an intricate plot intertwine in a Rubik’s Cube-like
whodunnit that keeps the reader turning the page’
– THE WESTSIDER
‘Readers will be intrigued by many red herrings,
and their interest maintained by the various
twists and turns before the narrative reaches
its unexpected and tense conclusion’
– BLUE WOLF REVIEWS
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/dead-and-gone
PBO 978-0-85730-806-1 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-807-8 £4.99 // CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS World
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION New Zealand
17WHO IS VERA KELLY?
BOOK 1 IN THE VERA KELLY SERIES
ROSALIE KNECHT
New York City, 1962. Vera Kelly is struggling to make rent
and blend into the underground gay scene in Greenwich
Village. She’s working night shifts at a radio station when
her quick wits, sharp tongue, and technical skills get her
noticed by a recruiter for the CIA.
Next thing she knows she’s in Argentina, tasked with
wiretapping a congressman and infiltrating a group of
student activists in Buenos Aires. As Vera becomes more
and more enmeshed with the young radicals, the fragile
local government begins to split at the seams. When a
betrayal leaves her stranded in the wake of a coup, Vera
learns war makes for strange and unexpected bedfellows,
and she’s forced to take extreme measures to save herself.
An exhilarating page turner and perceptive coming-of-age
story, Who Is Vera Kelly? introduces an original, wry and
whip-smart female spy for the twenty-first century.
‘A good old fashioned spy thriller but with a brilliant
kick-ass female protagonist’ – NICOLA STURGEON
‘Gripping, magnificently written… This is a cool,
strolling boulevardier of a book, worldly, wry, unrushed
but never slow, which casts its gaze upon the middle of
the last century and forces us to consider how it might
be failing us still’ – NEW YORK TIMES
‘Forget about 007. This heroine has her own brand of
spycraft’ – WASHINGTON POST
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/who-is-vera-kelly
PBO 978-0-85730-810-8 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-811-5 £4.99 // CATEGORY Espionage/Crime Fiction
RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada // OTHER PUBLISHERS Tin House – US & Canada // AUTHOR LOCATION New Jersey, USA
18VERA KELLY IS NOT
A MYSTERY
BOOK 2 IN THE VERA KELLY SERIES
ROSALIE KNECHT
When ex-CIA agent Vera Kelly loses her job and her
girlfriend in a single day, she reluctantly goes into business
as a private detective. Heartbroken and cash-strapped, she
takes a case that dredges up dark memories and attracts
dangerous characters from across the Cold War landscape.
Before it’s over, she’ll chase a lost child through foster care
and follow a trail of Dominican exiles to the Caribbean.
Forever looking over her shoulder, she nearly misses what’s
right in front of her: her own desire for home, connection,
and a new romance at the local bar.
In this exciting second instalment of the Vera Kelly series,
Rosalie Knecht challenges and deepens the Vera we love: WINNER OF
a woman of sparkling wit, deep moral fibre, and martini- THE 2021 SUE GRAFTON
dry humour who knows how to follow a case even as she MEMORIAL AWARD
struggles to follow her heart.
‘Vera, outwardly cool but inwardly seething, makes for
great company. Rosalie Knecht – proving it can be done
– has created something truly original’
– TIMES & SUNDAY TIMES CRIME CLUB
‘Wonderfully sardonic yet compassionate heroine.
Definitely a series to watch’ – MAIL ON SUNDAY
‘This smart, stylish mystery fizzes with wit and intrigue’
– IRISH TIMES (Crime Books of the Year)
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/vera-kelly-is-not-a-mystery
PBO 978-0-85730-812-2 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-813-9 £4.99 // CATEGORY Crime Fiction
RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada // AUDIO EDITION W F Howes // OTHER PUBLISHERS Tin House – US & Canada
AUTHOR LOCATION New Jersey, USA
19DEAD FLOWERS
BOOK 1 IN THE DR SIAN LOVE SERIES
NICOLA MONAGHAN
SHE DOESN’T TRUST THE POLICE.
SHE USED TO BE ONE OF THEM.
Hardened by ten years on the murder squad, DNA expert
Doctor Sian Love has seen it all. So when she finds two dead
bodies in her new home, she knows the drill.
But this time it’s different. This time, it’s personal...
A page-turning cold case investigation, Dead Flowers is
an intriguing, multi-layered story perfect for fans of Kate
Atkinson’s Case Histories.
‘An intriguing murder mystery... Monaghan has a flair
for leading the reader in a certain direction only to shift
path further along’ – NB MAGAZINE
‘Tension builds slowly but surely in this dark gripper’
– SUNDAY SPORT
‘Old murders, family secrets and long-told lies are
the ingredients of this splendid, gripping crime debut’
– WILLIAM RYAN, author of the Captain Korolev series
‘A beautifully crafted dual narrative story of deadly
familial secrets and lies. All great crime novels are
love stories gone appallingly awry and this is
absolutely one of those’
– HENRY SUTTON, Professor of Creative Writing and
Crime Fiction at University of East Anglia
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/dead-flowers
PBO 978-0-85730-802-3 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-803-0 £4.99 // CATEGORY Crime Fiction // RIGHTS World
AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // AUTHOR LOCATION Nottingham, UK
20THE RIGHTEOUS SPY
MERLE NYGATE
Eli Amiram is Mossad’s star spy runner and the man
responsible for bringing unparalleled intelligence to the
Israeli agency. Now, he’s leading an audacious operation in
the UK that feeds his ambition but threatens his conscience.
The British and the Americans have intel Mossad
desperately need. To force MI6 and the CIA into sharing
their priceless information, Eli and his maverick colleague
Rafi undertake a risky mission to trick their allies: faking a
terrorist plot on British soil.
But in the world of espionage, the game is treacherous,
opaque and deadly...
A twisting international spy novel, The Righteous Spy is an
intriguing tale of espionage that portrays a clandestine world
in which moral transgressions serve higher causes.
‘A tense, compelling thriller, The Righteous Spy
combines the high drama of a spy story with a clear-
eyed telling of the grubby compromises and betrayals
that are the reality of agents’ lives’
– HARRIET TYCE, Sunday Times bestselling author
THE RIGHTEOUS SPY WAS THE LAUNCH TITLE
FOR VERVE AND HAS GONE ON TO SELL
OVER 10,000 COPIES.
MERLE NYGATE is a screenwriter,
script editor, screenwriting lecturer
and novelist; she’s worked on BAFTA
winning TV, New York Festival audio
drama and written original sitcoms;
previously she worked for BBC Comedy
Commissioning as well as writing and
script editing across multiple genres.
Most recently, Merle completed her
first espionage novel which won the
AVAILABLE NOW Little Brown/UEA Crime Fiction Award.
vervebooks.co.uk/the-righteous-spy It was described by the judge as
‘outstanding’.
PBO 978-0-85730-800-9 £9.99 // EB 978-0-85730-801-6 £4.99
CATEGORY Espionage // RIGHTS World // AUDIO EDITION W F Howes merlenygate.com
AUTHOR LOCATION Esher, UK @MerleNygate
21THE LOST GIRLS
HEATHER YOUNG
In 1935, six-year-old Emily Evans vanishes forever from her
family’s summer house on a remote Minnesota Lake.
Sixty years later, Lucy, Emily’s quiet and watchful older sister,
lives alone in the lake house.
When Lucy dies, she leaves the house to her grandniece,
Justine. The lake house offers Justine an escape from her
manipulative boyfriend and a chance to give her daughters
the home she never had.
But the discovery of a notebook, in which her great aunt has
written the story of that devastating summer, forces Justine
to realise there may be more to her inheritance than she
first imagined.
In a house haunted by the sorrows of the women who came SELECTED AS
before her, Justine must overcome their tragic legacy if she A SUNDAY TIMES CRIME
hopes to save herself and her children. BOOK OF THE MONTH
‘Haunting’
– SUNDAY TIMES (Crime Book of the Month)
‘Cleverly told through dual timelines of Lucy’s journals
and Justine’s voice, this is sensitive and tense
storytelling’ – DAILY MAIL
‘Suspenseful, gripping and heartbreaking’ – HEAT
‘A powerful and bruising drama... The story unwinds
with a slow but insidious unease, building relentlessly
to its shattering and heart-breaking conclusion’
– PHILIPPA EAST, CWA Dagger-shortlisted
author of Little White Lies
‘For all the beauty of Young’s writing, her novel is
a dark one... and the murder mystery that drives it is
as shocking as anything you’re likely to read for a good
long while’ – NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
AVAILABLE NOW vervebooks.co.uk/the-lost-girls
PBO 978-0-85730-818-4 £9.99 // EB (available now) 978-0-85730-819-1 £4.99 // CATEGORY Crime Fiction/Thriller
RIGHTS UK & Comm ex Canada // AUDIO EDITION Ulverscroft // OTHER PUBLISHERS HarperCollins – US & Canada
AUTHOR LOCATION California, USA
22VERVE BOOKS VERVE BOOKS
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23VERVEBOOKS.CO.UK @Verve_Books 24
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