Description

‘Anthony Quinn has found an ingenious way of shaping the story into a gripping work of fiction… a compelling mixture of crime story and character study’ Sunday Times

‘A dark, unsettling, completely addictive mystery’ Jonathan Coe

‘A beguiling real-life crime thriller’ Chris Brookmyre

‘Absorbing.. The Mouthless Dead is as engrossing as it is unsettling’ Emma Flint

One night in 1931 William Wallace was handed a phone message at his chess club from a Mr Qualtrough, asking him to meet at an address to discuss some work. Wallace caught a tram from the home he shared with his wife, Julia, to the address which turned out, after Wallace had consulted passers-by and even a policeman, to not exist.

On returning home two hours later he found his wife beaten to death in the parlour. The elaborate nature of his alibi pointed to Wallace as the culprit. He was arrested and tried, found guilty of murder and sentenced to hang, but the next month the Court of Criminal Appeal sensationally overturned the verdict and he walked free. The killer was never found.

Fifteen years on, the inspector who worked the case is considering it once more. Speculation continues to be rife over the true killer’s identity. James Agate in his diary called it ‘the perfect murder’, Raymond Chandler said ‘The case is unbeatable. It will always be unbeatable’. And on a cruise in 1947, new information is about to come to light.

Publisher Review

Anthony Quinn has found an ingenious way of shaping the story into a gripping work of fiction… a compelling mixture of crime story and character study * Sunday Times * A voyage of discovery… this superior whodunnit becomes a danse macabre as the terrible truth is gradually revealed * The Times * Anthony Quinn is one of our most underrated novelists, so I’m always happy to sing his praises. Initially, The Mouthless Dead is a fictional account of the infamous unsolved murder of housewife Julia Wallace in Liverpool in 1931. But then the story and its narrator takes a series of unexpected turns until its final, chilling paragraph. I was gripped * Red Magazine * A dark, unsettling, completely addictive mystery, which draws you in with all the momentum and all the loving attention to period detail that we’ve come to expect from Anthony Quinn * Jonathan Coe * A beguiling real-life crime thriller and an elegiac meditation on murder, marriage and loneliness * Chris Brookmyre * This absorbing account of one of the most famous unsolved British murder cases creates a fascinating narrative about what really happened. The Mouthless Dead is as engrossing as it is unsettling * Emma Flint, author of Little Deaths * Intensely readable and indelibly haunting — Alexander Larman * Observer * Thrilling… the final fifty pages accelerate until breathing becomes almost impossible * Financial Times *