Robert Lautner

'Outstandingly weird and memorable' GUARDIAN 'Deliciously creepy' NEW SCIENTIST Fear never dies… These stories from eighteen master storytellers will curdle your blood, haunt your dreams and redefine terror. From a hungry young woman who is not what she seems, to a boy who has taken his mother's advice a little too seriously; from disfigured girls willing to pay any price to fit in, to an immigrant who cannot escape his tormentor in his new home country; from a new home with a sinister secret, to the discovery that a long-dead parent’s corpse is perfectly preserved decades later; this collection plumbs the depths of the psyche and dredges up some very modern horrors.

‘Puts some of the balls back into serious English fiction’ GILES COREN, THE TIMES ‘Whisky-soaked, guttural, stinking and funny' EVIE WYLD, OBSERVER ‘Thrilling, brutal, poetic, literary and irresistible, one of the 21st century’s first great 20th-century American novels' LOUISA YOUNG Before there was Jaws, there was… QUINT You already know the end of his story: now find out where it all began. Quint: the taciturn and grizzled sea captain who survived the shark-ridden sinking of the USS Indianapolis, only to meet his maker in the maw of a Great White at the end of JAWS. So much more than a fisherman – a survivor, a fighter, a man who has left three wives in his wake. In this vivid and utterly compelling masterpiece, Robert Lautner reimagines the life of a truly iconic character. ‘Excellent… a profound portrait of a life dislocated by war and violence’ THE TIMES, Best Summer Reads ‘If Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea was doused in whiskey and strained through the gills of a tiger shark, it would not sound dissimilar… one of this year’s literary miracles' IRISH INDEPENDENT

'Puts some of the balls back into serious English fiction' GILES COREN, THE TIMES'Whisky-soaked, guttural, stinking and funny' EVIE WYLD, OBSERVER'Thrilling, brutal, poetic, literary and irresistible, one of the 21st century's first great 20th-century American novels' LOUISA YOUNGBefore there was Jaws, there was... QUINT

'Uncannily brilliantâ?¦ a book to be swallowed whole' EVIE WYLD â?? Excellentâ?¦ a profound portrait of a life dislocated by war and violenceâ?? THE TIMES Before there was Jaws, there wasâ?¦ QUINT

Speak out for the fate of millions or turn a blind eye? We all have choices. â?? Absolutely exceptional. So beautifully written, with precision and wisdom and real emotional acuity â?¦ A remarkable achievementâ?? STEPHEN KELMAN, author of Pigeon English

A novel that hits right to the heart of fans of Cold Mountain and True Grit. Set in 1837, this is the completely compelling story of 12-year-old orphan Thomas Walker and his treacherous journey home through the wide open lands of America.