Anna Bailey

'A collection of stories that feel like worlds in their own right, masterworks in miniature. This book is the short story form in the hands of a master. Anna Bailey is a once-in-a-generation talent' C J Cooke Wasteland Girls is a collection of lyrical, incisive and luminous stories by the Sunday Times bestselling author of Tall Bones and Our Last Wild Days. These stunningly powerful stories explore the wildness and beauty of the American heartlands, a place where lives are lived on the margins, but also where there is dignity, hope, revenge and restitution. In 'Long Way to Come for a Sip of Water', which was shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award, Texan man Ready drives through a divided US to see his dying brother. Wasteland Girls, the title story, is a powerful tale of a family of hoarders, of magic and revenge. In Yukon 1940, a woman sits beside the body of her husband in a remote cabin, trapped by the frozen sea. The Girl in the Ground follows a woman who suddenly reappears after twenty years of absence, but for whom the past is a void. A widower meets a man who should died many times. Deeply atmospheric and soulful, the stories in Wasteland Girls are inspired by the author's experience of living amid the beautiful but often ferocious remote landscapes of the US, and among the wild and secretive people who inhabit them. In the vastness of the wilds, anything can happen...

For fans of All the Colours of the Dark and Where the Crawdads Sing, a beautiful atmospheric thriller from the Sunday Times bestselling author of Tall BonesTHE TIMES BOOK OF THE MONTH'Propulsive, bold and brutal...A truly atmospheric thriller.' Chris Whitaker, bestselling author of All the Colours of the Dark'Bewitching... thought provoking, character driven crime fiction.' Paula Hawkins, bestselling author of The Girl on the Train‘Sublime. The best thing I’ve read in ages.’ Will Dean, bestselling author of The Chamber______The Labasques aren’t like other families. To the good people of Jacknife, Louisiana, they are trouble-makers. Outcasts. The kind of people you don’t want living on your doorstep. So when Cutter Labasque’s body is found face down in the swamp, most people don’t care. Only Loyal May, once Cutter’s closest friend, isn’t like most people. She betrayed Cutter the day she left town. Now, perhaps she’s the only one who can find out her true story…_______‘What lifts Anna Bailey’s marvellous second novel is the hothouse lyricism of their writing, which is as lush as the setting’ The Times Book of the Month‘A brooding, evocative novel’ i paper best new crime and thriller books‘The author hit the Sunday Times bestseller list with their debut… and I’m certain this will follow’ Prima‘A remarkable job of conjuring up the haunted swamplands of southern Louisiana…A particularly spicy gumbo of a thriller’ Daily Mail______WHAT READERS & AUTHORS ARE SAYING ABOUT OUR LAST WILD DAYS:'A masterpiece...you will be hooked!' 5-star reader review'A sweltering fever dream of a novel – brimming with atmosphere, tension, and a truly unforgettable cast of characters.' Colin Walsh, bestselling author of Kala'If you like Chris Whitaker (another Brit who does small-town America so well) this is for you' 5-star reader review'The heat and humidity sink into your bones as you are sucked into the lives of the people of the backwaters' 5-star reader review'With a setting as atmospheric as Where the Crawdads Sing...a stunningly written thriller' Nikki Smith, author of Look What You Made Me Do'A brooding atmosphere with loads of twists along the way that will keep you guessing' 5-star reader review'Exquisite. A rare, extraordinary talent' C.J.Cooke, bestselling author of The Lighthouse Witches'Every page is enthralling and to be read with your breath held against what's coming next.' 5-star reader review'Likely to be one of my books of the year' 5-star reader review'Filled with lines worth tattooing and passages worth framing.' Megan Collins, author of Cross my Heart'Anna Bailey is the master of things that move in the dark, with language so lush you feel like you could reach out and touch it' Hayley Scrivenor, bestselling author of Dirt Town 'Raw and unflinching...a stunner.' Ashley Winstead, author of Midnight is the Darkest Hour'I didn't want this one to end...a perfect crime thriller' 5-star reader review

In Jacknife, Louisiana, menace comes not only from the lurking ''gators, but from the secrets harboured by everyone in town...From the Sunday Times bestselling author comes a compelling, utterly immersive thriller ''Propulsive, bold and brutal...A truly atmospheric thriller.'' Chris Whitaker, bestselling author of All the Colours of the Dark''Bewitching... thought provoking, character driven crime fiction.'' Paula Hawkins, bestselling author of The Girl on the Train‘Sublime. The best thing I’ve read in ages.’ Will Dean, bestselling author of The Chamber_______The Labasques aren’t like other families.Living in a shack out in the swamps, they scrape a living hunting down alligators just to get by. To the good people of Jacknife, Louisiana, they are trouble-makers, outcasts, the kind of people you wouldn’t want living on your doorstep.So when Cutter Labasque is found face down in the muddy swamp, no one seems to care, not even her two rough-cut brothers. The only person who questions the official verdict of suicide is Cutter’s childhood friend, Loyal May, who has just returned home to care for her ageing mother.Loyal left town at the age of 18, having betrayed everything she valued most. Now, there may be no way for her to find forgiveness, but there may be restitution, if she can find out what really did happen to Cutter...Set against the haunting beauty of Southern Louisiana, Our Last Wild Days is a compulsive, evocative novel about a tight-knit community and the secrets they want to keep hidden.______WHAT READERS & AUTHORS ARE SAYING ABOUT OUR LAST WILD DAYS:''A masterpiece...you will be hooked!'' 5-star reader review''A sweltering fever dream of a novel – brimming with atmosphere, tension, and a truly unforgettable cast of characters.'' Colin Walsh, bestselling author of Kala''If you like Chris Whitaker (another Brit who does small-town America so well) this is for you'' 5-star reader review''The heat and humidity sink into your bones as you are sucked into the lives of the people of the backwaters'' 5-star reader review''With a setting as atmospheric as Where the Crawdads Sing...a stunningly written thriller'' Nikki Smith, author of Look What You Made Me Do''A brooding atmosphere with loads of twists along the way that will keep you guessing'' 5-star reader review''Exquisite. A rare, extraordinary talent'' C.J.Cooke, bestselling author of The Lighthouse Witches''Every page is enthralling and to be read with your breath held against what''s coming next.'' 5-star reader review''Likely to be one of my books of the year'' 5-star reader review''Filled with lines worth tattooing and passages worth framing.'' Megan Collins, author of Cross my Heart''Anna Bailey is the master of things that move in the dark, with language so lush you feel like you could reach out and touch it'' Hayley Scrivenor, bestselling author of Dirt Town ''Raw and unflinching...a stunner.'' Ashley Winstead, author of Midnight is the Darkest Hour''I didn''t want this one to end...a perfect crime thriller'' 5-star reader review

Když se sedmnáctiletá Emma na lesní párty loučí se svou nejlepší kamarádkou Abigail, je stejně jako většina dívek v jejím věku přesvědčená, že opravdový život mají teprve před sebou. Jenže onoho večera se toho přihodí hodně... a druhý den není Abi k nalezení... Na fasádě malého města uprostřed lesů a hor amerického Středozápadu způsobí Abino nevysvětlitelné zmizení trhliny a skrz ně se postupně valí na světlo léta potlačovaná zášť, dobře skryté prohřešky a maskované předsudky. Především v Abině rodině vyvstanou otázky, které si žádají odpovědi: co tu noc dělal její starší bratr Noah, kterého Abi podrazila; co všechno ví citlivý Jude, nejmladší ze sourozenců, plný jizev na těle i na duši; co si nepřipouští jejich matka Dolly a co všechno má v hlavě otec Samuel, podléhající pastorovi, jenž si svým svatouškovským moralizováním podmanil celé město. A potom je tu Rat, přivandrovalec, jehož nezařaditelnost některé z místních znervózňuje a jiné fascinuje. Městečko Whistling Ridge, na pohled ospale nehybné, připomíná soudek střelného prachu, který jen čeká na jiskru. Zmizení Abi vyhodí dosavadní skutečnost do povětří a v pomalu usedajícím zvířeném prachu se pomalu odkrývá pravda o tom, co se tehdy v noci u skal zvaných Holé kosti skutečně odehrálo... Za dveřmi tma se hned po svém vydání stalo literární senzací a aspirantem na jeden z nejlepších thrillerů roku 2021.

'An intricate and compelling thriller, beautifully nuanced and wonderfully claustrophobic. Brilliant.' SJ WATSON, author of Before I Go to Sleep When seventeen-year-old Emma leaves her best friend Abi at a party in the woods, she believes, like most girls her age, that their lives are just beginning. Many things will happen that night, but Emma will never see her friend again. Abi's disappearance cracks open the facade of the small town of Whistling Ridge, its intimate history of long-held grudges and resentment. Even within Abi's family, there are questions to be asked - of Noah, the older brother whom Abi betrayed, of Jude, the shining younger sibling who hides his battle scars, of Dolly, her mother and Samuel, her father - both in thrall to the fire and brimstone preacher who holds the entire town in his grasp. Then there is Rat, the outsider, whose presence in the town both unsettles and excites those around him. Anything could happen in Whistling Ridge, this tinder box of small-town rage, and all it will take is just one spark - the truth of what really happened that night out at the Tall Bones.... 'Smart and compassionate, full of poetry and rage and shy hopes and shredded dreams and missing girls and family secrets and the dark, shameful underbelly of small town life.' TAMMY COHEN, author of Stop at Nothing