Denise Mina

'Denise Mina is the cream of the crop, an author who pushes the crime novel in new and exciting directions and never fails to deliver.' IAN RANKIN When Margo goes in search of her birth mother for the first time, she meets her aunt, Nikki, instead. Margo learns that her mother, Susan, was a sex worker murdered soon after Margo's adoption. To this day, Susan's killer has never been found. Nikki asks Margo for help. She has received threatening and haunting letters from the murderer, for decades. She is determined to find him, but she can't do it alone... A brilliant, thought-provoking and heart-wrenching new thriller about identity and the value of a life, from the award-winning author of The Long Drop and Conviction. PRAISE FOR DENISE MINA: 'You won't be able to put Conviction down' Reese Witherspoon 'Unsettling, evocative and staggeringly good' Daily Express 'A masterpiece by the woman who may be Britain's finest living crime novelist' Daily Telegraph 'An atmospheric recreation of a vanished Glasgow...and a compelling exploration of the warped criminal mind' The Times on The Long Drop: Top Ten Crime Novels of the Decade

The Less Dead

Laura Dobie

In the new, shockingly current thriller by Denise Mina, solving one mystery leads to another: Margot finally learns her birth mother's identity, only to discover that the woman's murderer is still at large -- and sending threatening letters. Margot is having a thirtysomething crisis: She's burning out at work, a public-health practice; she's just left her longtime boyfriend after discovering he was cheating; and her mother recently died. The only silver lining to her mother's death is that Margot, who was adopted, can finally go looking for her birth mother. What she finds is an imcomplete family--the only person left is Nikki, her mother's older sister. Aunt Nikki brings upetting news: Margot's mother is dead, murdered many years ago, one of a series of sex workers killed in Glasgow. The killer--or killers?--has never been found, Aunt Nikki claims. They're still at large... and sending her letters, gloating letters that the details of the crime. Now Margot must choose: take the side of the world against her dead mother, or investigate her murder and see that justice is done at last. Darkly funny and sharply modern, Denise Mina's latest novel is an indelible, surprisingly moving story of daughters and mothers, blood family and chosen family, and how the search for truth helps one woman to find herself.

Cheri McElroy

I love Denise Mina. She writes thrillers that also expose social issues that I rarely think about. In Conviction, it was male anorexia. Here, it is prostitution. Are prostitutes less dead, or less human? The answer should be no.

I am glad I took this deep-dive into Glasgow with Denise.

A gripping, well-written thriller with a sense of place, which highlights how society treats sex workers.

The Less Dead

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