A Narrow Door: The electric psychological thriller from the Sunday Times bestseller

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But around Chapter 11 when she started banging on again about the noises in the drain, it was time for me to bail. It is hard to stop reading at any point because the reader, like Roy, develops a desperate need to find out the truth. The saintly Conrad of childhood memory is revealed to have been cruel, petty and manipulative; young Becky has a secret life her parents know nothing about, and even Emily, Rebecca’s young daughter, is secretive and at times, incomprehensible. There is such cunning and sharpness here, it's a story that totally enfolds the reader and doesn't let go until the very final line. The divisions of this book alone, based around the five rivers in the Greek Underworld, enchanted me.

A Narrow Door’ is a compulsive journey through the dark places of the human mind, where memory, truth and fact melt away like mirages. Forty year old Rebecca Buckfast has become the first headmistress in the history of St Oswald’s school and is determined to make changes. This actually didn’t matter that I hadn’t read either of the previous books, I quite happily read this as a standalone. The pace and tempo increases in Phlegethan (Burning) where tension is as taut as piano wire as the narrow door of suspicion crashes and burns and is battered down in Styx (hate).

A Narrow Door is a well plotted and clever story of ambition, murder and coming to terms with the past.

It does work as a stand-alone story, but, ideally, read the previous books first, before embarking on this one. Why do you think the author chose to include a trans character in this book, and how does Ben’s decision to reveal this affect Straitley? While not quite as philosophical, and a bit more plot-driven, the writing was absolutely superb and the school atmosphere permeated the story very well.She holds honorary doctorates from the Universities of Sheffield and Huddersfield, is an honorary Fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Roy Straitley is approached by a group of his students, they think they have found a body in the school's grounds.How has the death of Eric Scoones – and his subsequent exposure as an abuser of his pupils – affected Straitley?