by Sarah Hilary
In a minute, I think, in a minute I’ll choose. When there’s no more booming in my ears, when the echoes are gone and all I can hear is me.
Acknowledgements
I owe an enormous debt of thanks to Vicki Mellor, my editor at Pan Macmillan, whose patience, focus and gimlet eye turned the first draft of Fragile – finally – into this far better book. My agent, Jane Gregory, and her team, especially Stephanie Glencross, who saw me over the hurdles in style; and everyone at David Higham who helped their authors through an extraordinary year. Gillian Green, Matthew Cole and Hannah Corbett, together with the wider Pan Mac family, who welcomed me so warmly. Jessica Cuthbert-Smith, whose copy-edits were the kind authors dream of. Ami Smithson, who gave Fragile its beautiful face. Friends, sometimes found in far-flung places: Tama, Anne-Elisabeth, Susan P., Jane S., Paddy and his family, including Lola and Dolly. For solidarity and cheer, I could not have asked for better than Erin Kelly, Jane Casey, Mick Herron and Liz Nugent, who gave Fragile their time and attention when the world was demanding so much from each of us. My family, who survived all this with their sense of humour and their love intact. And Alison Graham, whose companionship made all the difference when it was most needed.
About the author
Sarah Hilary’s debut novel, Someone Else’s Skin, won the 2015 Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award and was a World Book Night selection. The Observer’s Book of the Month (‘superbly disturbing’) and a Richard and Judy Book Club bestseller, it has been published worldwide. No Other Darkness, the second in the series, was shortlisted for a Barry Award in the US. Fragile is Sarah’s first standalone novel and marks a departure from her acclaimed DI Marnie Rome series.
Also by Sarah Hilary
DI Marnie Rome series
Someone Else’s Skin
No Other Darkness
Tastes Like Fear
Quieter Than Killing
Come and Find Me
Never Be Broken
First published 2021 by Macmillan
This electronic edition published 2021 by Macmillan
an imprint of Pan Macmillan
The Smithson, 6 Briset Street, London EC1M 5NR
EU representative: Macmillan Publishers Ireland Limited,
Mallard Lodge, Lansdowne Village, Dublin 4
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-1-5290-2947-5
Copyright © Sarah Hilary 2021
Cover photographs: Frank Baquet / Plainpicture (orchid);
Jean Ladzinski / Trevillion Images (window);
Alex Maxim / Trevillion Images (hand)
Design: Ami Smithson, Macmillan Art Department
The right of Sarah Hilary to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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