New Crime & Mystery Fiction Titles From Michael Joseph 1998 April-June

File Updated: 01/04/00

New Crime & Mystery Fiction Titles From Michael Joseph APRIL-JUNE 1998

Nicci French The Safe House Published May 1998 by Michael Joseph at Ł10.00 ISBN: 0 71 814304 3 Artwork by: Jacket photograph: Michael Trevillion

Hailed as the new Minette Waiters, Nicci French is now firmly established as the latest name in crime writing following the huge success of her first novel The Memory Game. Now comes her second, an equally sophisticated psychological thriller which makes for compulsive reading.

A murderous savage attack in a quiet suburb of a provincial English town leaves a husband and wife dead and their teenage daughter with her throat cut - but alive.

Fearful the attackers may strike again, the police search for a haven for their one witness and turn to Dr Samantha Laschen, who seems ideal as protector. Dr Laschen is a pioneering specialist in the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder and has just moved into the area from London to an isolated house in the bleak Essex fenlands.

Despite being burdened with her own torments, torn between her non-committing lover Danny, her medical career and her little daughter Elsie, Samantha feels duty bound to provide a sanctuary. But what begins as a favour and a professional experiment ends as a fight for Samantha's own sanity, for the truth and ultimately for the very survival of all that is most precious to her.

The Safe House is a truly gripping read that takes to task the whole issue of post traumatic stress disorder. Is it really a medical condition or simply a state of mind to enable the victim to find comfort in being a casualty of their own circumstance?

Nicci French is the husband and wife team of the journalist Nicci Gerrard and writer Sean French. Together they manage to write seamless novels whilst juggling their own writing careers and a family of four young children. Their first novel The Memory Game was published and immediately went into the top ten of the bestseller lists. They live in North London.

Michael Ridpath The Marketmaker Published April 1998 by Michael Joseph at Ł10.00 ISBN: 0 7181 4316 7 Artwork by: Cover illustration: Bill Gregory
See Review by Lynda Ross
Ex-City trader Michael Ridpath, who is heralded as the Dick Francis of the Financial World, has chosen for his latest novel to write about the wildest and most volatile area of Finance the Emerging Markets. It's particularly poignant given the current situation in Asia and the knock-on effect this is having on the rest of the world's financial markets .
Writing about the precarious world of Emerging Markets fulfils a dream for Michael Ridpath. When he was in the City he always wanted to trade in this most exciting area of the financial world, but was prevented from doing so as it was deemed too risky.
They couldn't stop him writing about it though and in doing so it has lived up to all expectation. Although fraught with risk, if you're smart or lucky the pay-off can be huge and he found it fun, full of colourful characters, enormous egos and great stories.
People in the City are ambitious and highly competitive. The Marketmaker asks the question, how far will four investment bankers go to win? It's a question everyone in the City must ask themselves, and find it a difficult one to answer.
When Nick Elliot desperately needs a job, an old university contact leads to one at the aggressive broking firm of Dekker Ward. Led by the charismatic Ricardo Ross, the firm dominates the turbulent market in Latin American bonds and Ross himself is not afraid to bend rules - he is the Marketmaker. As Nick discovers, you are either with him or you make an enemy for life. At first Nick is content to ride his luck but when strange things start to happen to Dekker employees - one top trader is fired without reason, another dies in a bungled robbery and Isabel, the object of Nick's affections, is kidnapped, he begins to wonder just what sort of business is he really involved in? While Nick debates the wisdom of taking matters into his own hands, the all powerful Marketmaker is ready to make his move.…
Michael Ridpath was born in 1961 in Devon, but spent most of his childhood growing up in Yorkshire. He graduated with a First from Merton College, Oxford, and joined Saudi International Bank in London. He started as a credit analyst and then became a bond trader, ultimately managing a billion dollar bond portfolio including the largest junk bond portfolio in Europe. In 1991 he left the bank to join a venture capital firm Apax Partners.
In 1994 he took the publishing world by storm when he became one of those rare examples of a writer whose talent was spotted in an agents slush pile. His first novel, Free To Trade, was bought by 30 publishers around the world and he left the City to devote himself to writing fulltime; Free To Trade was published in 1995 and spent three months in the Sunday Times bestseller list, reaching number 2. His second Trading Reality, was published in 1996.