Description

‘A tour de force’
Guardian

‘A bloody yet surprisingly warm-hearted spin on The Godfather. Great stuff’
The Times, Best Thrillers of 2025

Babs Dionne, doting grandmother and vicious crime matriarch, rules her small town with an iron fist. She controls the flow of drugs into its borders with the help of her loyal lieutenants, girlfriends since they were teenagers, and her eldest daughter, Lori, a former soldier struggling with addiction.

When a drug cartel discovers that its numbers are down in the area, they send a malevolent force, known only as The Man, to investigate. At the same time, Babs’s youngest daughter, Sis, has gone missing, which doesn’t seem at all like a coincidence. In twenty-four hours, Sis will be found dead, and the whole town will seek shelter from Babs’s wrath…

Publisher Review

A bloody yet surprisingly warm-hearted spin on The Godfather. Great stuff * The Times, Best Thrillers of 2025 * Leavened by a surprising amount of humour and empathy, this is the vivid, tragic and violent story of people trying to do their best against insurmountable odds: a tour de force * Guardian * Darkly funny… an unforgettable tale of power, love and survival in the heart of Maine * Seattle Times * A Shakespearean drama… An addictive and unforgettable read * Boston Globe * Literary thrillers just don’t come any better * Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Somebody’s Fool * Heartfelt, beguiling, gritty, and true * Justin Cronin, bestselling author of The Ferryman * A furious page-turner that kept me up way past my bedtime * Matthew Quick, bestselling author of The Silver Linings Playbook * Reads like a French-Canadian The Godfather… A rare novel of equal appeal to fans of Elizabeth Strout and Dennis Lehane * Michael Koryta, bestselling author of An Honest Man * An unputdownable story and the perfect ending that leaves you teary and utterly satisfied * Angie Kim, bestselling author of Happiness Falls * Darkly funny, shocking, and unblinking… Who would guess that there’s another Godfather saga? * C.J. Box, bestselling author of Three-Inch Teeth * Ruthless, beautiful, cutthroat, gorgeous, poignant, incendiary, and important… I am in awe * Ivy Pochoda, prize-winning author of Sing Her Down * An electrifying achievement by Currie, epic in its ambition but intimate in its focus… This will hold up as one of the best crime-fiction books of 2025 * Air Mail *