TheLittle Friend

This new edition in a beautiful new cover makes it perfect for summer readingWinner of the prestigious WH Smith Literary Award 2003Shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2003'An unsettling tale in the Southern Gothic vain ... mesmerisingly good ... Tartt tells her nightmarish tale in dreamy prose - stylish, luxuriant and devastatingly streamlined' Daily MailDonna Tartt is a novelist, essayist and critic. Her first novel, The Secret History, has been published in twenty-three countries._______________ 'In a literary age of diet and dearth, Tartt invites us to feast ... the opening tragedy strikes a note of rich, flamboyant Southern Gothic that resonates throughout' - Independent 'You will rarely have read better ... Because of Tartt's mastery of suspense, this book will grip readers all the way through to its bitter end' - Guardian 'Destined to become a special kind of classic - a book that precocious young readers pluck from their parents' shelves and devour with surreptitious eagerness, thrilled to discover a writer who seems at once to read their minds and to offer up the sweet-and-sour fruits of exotic, forbidden knowledge' - New York Times Book Review _______________ Donna Tartt's huge selling second novel, follow up to the worldwide bestseller The Secret History The sunlit rails gleamed like dark mercury, arteries branching out silver from the switch points; the old telegraph poles were shaggy with kudzu and Virginia creeper and, above them, rose the water tower, its surface all washed out by the sun. Harriet, cautiously, stepped towards it in the weedy clearing. Around and around it she walked, around the rusted metal legs. One day is never, ever discussed by the Cleve family. The day that nine-year-old Robin was found hanging by the neck from a tree in their front garden. Twelve years later the family are no nearer to uncovering the truth of what happened to him. Inspired by Houdini and Robert Louis Stevenson, twelve-year-old Harriet sets out to find her brother's murderer - and punish him. But what starts out as a child's game soon becomes a dangerous journey into the menacing underworld of a small Mississippi town.Donna Tartt's huge selling second novel, follow up to the worldwide bestseller The Secret History'In a literary age of diet and dearth, Tartt invites us to feast ... the opening tragedy strikes a note of rich, flamboyant Southern Gothic that resonates throughout''You will rarely have read better ... Because of Tartt's mastery of suspense, this book will grip readers all the way through to its bitter end''Tartt's grip on this billowing plot is glue-like and her ability to evoke the Deep South of last century exceptional ... excellent, enthralling''Destined to become a special kind of classic - a book that precocious young readers pluck from their parents' shelves and devour with surreptitious eagerness, thrilled to discover a writer who seems at once to read their minds and to offer up the sweet-and-sour fruits of exotic, forbidden knowledge'Donna Tartt's huge selling second novel, follow up to the worldwide bestseller The Secret History