Carol O'Connell

Page Updated: 17/05/00

Carol O'Connell

Shell Game

Judas Child

Flight of the Stone Angel

Killing Critics

Mallory's Oracle

About the Author (Photo by Jerry Bauer)

Bibliography

First British Edition Hutchinson (1999)

Shell Game
Oliver Tree had spent his retirement years working out a solution to the Lost Illusion. Now, at last, he was about to give a death-defying performance in a sell-out festival of magicians in Manhattan.
In front of a live audience and the television cameras, four crossbow arrows were fired at their human target. The screams were real, and, tragically for Oliver Tree, so was the blood.
Even if Charles Butler, cousin of the late great Max Candle who had invented the Lost Illusion, was convinced along with eight million viewers that the trick had simply gone wrong, Detective Sgt Kathy Mallory knew instinctively that this was murder. A murder, curiously, that might be linked with the death of a woman half a century ago...
"O'Connell never ceases to amaze, producing what is surely her most stunning novel yet… anyone unmoved by the soul-shattering climax should give up reading fiction altogether" Booklist

First British Edition Hutchinson (1999)

Paperback - Arrow (1999)

Judas Child
See Review by Val McDermid - Gold Dagger winner & creator of Lindsay Gordon, Kate Brannigan & Tony Hill
Sadie Green's purple bicycle was found abandoned at the bus stop. Then her friend, Gwen, disappeared, which led the police to propose a runaway theory to the press.
But State Police Investigator Rouge Kendall wasn't convinced. On a barstool in Dame's Tavern, where Kendall spent a little too much time, he remembered his own mother, begging for the life of his twin sister, Susan.
That was fifteen years ago. And a man had been imprisoned for that murder - a priest, barely in his twenties.
Father Paul Marie continued to proclaim his innocence. And current events might prove that he was telling the truth, that someone else might be responsible for all three crimes...
Taut, menacing, intensely felt, Carol O'Connell's fifth novel reveals a total mastery of her craft.
'A menacing and unsettling thriller set against a mysterious winter landscape that reflects the cold heart of a serial killer… Carol O'Connell is a unique talent who deserves to be a household name. The Judas Child is a scary monster of a book that should make her just that.' Val McDermid
'A heart-stopping, twist-in-the-tail novel of intelligence and suspense. True thrills don't come cheap, but they sometimes come as well-written and mesmerizing as this' Frances Fyfield, Mail on Sunday
'O'Connell never ceases to amaze, producing what is surely her most stunning novel yet ...Violent murder mystery, heart-breaking love story, intricate allegory, tangled tale of redemption and forgiveness O'Connell's novel is all of these and more. Few readers will be able to resist the charms of her lyrical prose or her daringly original plot, and anyone unmoved by the soul-shattering climax should give up reading fiction altogether.' Booklist
'Scarily good' - Richard North Patterson
'Compulsive reading, a genuine page-turner, in which the "whodunnit" is only part of the puzzle' Peter Millar, The Times

Flight of the Stone Angel
'The many fans O'Connell has won over with her first three novels will glimpse not only some of the mettle beneath her computer-hacker heroine's steely facade, but also the breadth of her own talent. Here she conjures up a world of almost Faulknerian richness and complexity ...In Flight of the Stone Angel O'Connell's imagination truly takes wing' People
'Mallory is an intriguing, original and disturbing creation' - The Times
'Here is a novel that grabs hold early on and draws you all the way into a world of secrets, mystery, murder, revenge and innocence lost ...O'Connell's prose lifts ordinary passages into poetry and her deft, bold characterizations render even such minor characters memorable long after the last page is turned ...From any angle, O'Connell's latest is a stunningly original mystery sure to draw raves from Mallory fans and send droves of new readers scurrying to the series' earlier titles' Publishers Weekly
'Against a richly realised Southern Gothic background, a strange and exotic story works itself out. By the end of this novel, I was breathless with excitement, moved almost to tears by Mallory's tragedy and the damage that has resulted from it, and emotionally drained. You won't read another crime novel quite like this all year' - Val McDermid, Manchester Evening News
'If you don't know Carol O'Connell's work, now's the time to make a great new discovery. You're in for a real treat' - Liverpool Post

First British Edition Hutchinson (1996)

Killing Critics
See Review by Phyllis Davis
See Review by Val McDermid - Gold Dagger winner & creator of Lindsay Gordon, Kate Brannigan & Tony Hill
"The new wave of art was first heralded by the graffiti artist who attacked the city walls - artist attacks architecture. Then it progressed to the vandal artist who scarred the art of others - artist attacks art. And now we see a further escalation in the performance-art murder of Dean Starr - artist attacks artist. This is the new wave - Art Terrorism." So wrote Andrew Bliss, art critic, alcoholic, and serious, state of the art Bloomingdales' shopper. Bliss was not celebrated for his radical opinions, and no one suspected he might know something about a terrible crime committed twelve years earlier in one Avril Koozeman's galleries.
Inspector Louis Markowitz, who commanded the Special Crimes Section in New York, had worked on that original double homicide, and now his adopted daughter, Detective Sergeant Kathy Mallory, wants to reopen the old case - against the Department's wishes. A number of people in high places are also very keen that their secrets remain buried with the dead.

First British Edition Hutchinson (1994)

Mallory's Oracle
The body of an elderly woman is discovered in a park in Gramercy Square. She has been killed in broad daylight, but there is not a single witness.
Inspector Louis Markowitz, who commands the Special Crime Section in New York, dies defending another Gramercy Square victim, and Sergeant Kathy Mallory takes up the case. Mallory is a crimes' analyst, a woman who prefers the company of computers to people. Now she must do field work for the first time, hunting humans.
Mallory's motives, however, are very personal. Louis Markowitz rescued her as a child from a life of petty crime on the streets of New York, and adopted her as his daughter. The investigation into a possible serial killer is also an investigation into Mallory's damaged psyche, and into a disturbed and dangerous urban universe.
This is the debut of a remarkable new talent - an author who has created a broodingly atmospheric, psychotic city landscape and a fascinating and original character in her computer genius detective heroine.
"Sgt. Kathleen Mallory is one of the most original and intriguing detectives you'll ever meet. In fact, Mallory's Oracle is stocked with characters who are richly unforgettable, even by New York standards. This novel is wild, sly and breathless - all things that a good thriller ought to be." Carl Hiaasen

About The Author
Born in 1947, Carol O'Connell studied at the California Institute or Arts/Chouinard and the Arizona State University. For many years she survived on occasional sales of her paintings as well as freelance proof-reading and copy-editing.
At the age of 46, Carol O'Connell sent the manuscript of Mallory's Oracle to Hutchinson, because she felt that a British publisher would be sympathetic to a first time novelist and because Hutchinson also publish Ruth Rendell. Having miraculously found the book on the 'slush pile', Hutchinson immediately came back with an offer for world rights, not just for, Mallory's Oracle but for the second book featuring the same captivating heroine.
At the Frankfurt Book Fair, Hutchinson sold the rights to Dutch, French and German publishers for six figure sums. Mallory's Oracle was then taken back to the States where it was sold, at auction, to Puttman for over $800,000.
Carol O'Connell is now writing full time.

Bibliography
N.B. dates and publishers in dark red indicate British First Editions. Dates and publishers in black indicate recent reprints.

Shell Game (Hutchinson, 1999) (Kathleen Mallory)

Judas Child (Hutchinson, 1999) Arrow Pbk Nov 99

Flight of the Stone Angel (Hutchinson, 1997) Arrow Pbk Apr 98

Killing Critics (Hutchinson, 1996) (Kathleen Mallory)

Man Who Lied to Women (Hutchinson, 1995) (Kathleen Mallory)

Mallory's Oracle (Hutchinson, 1994) (Kathleen Mallory)

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