Part of Philomena McCarthy
First published 2025
Philomena McCarthy patrols the streets of London carrying a secret: her father and uncles run one of the city's most notorious criminal families. She joined the Metropolitan Police anyway, and so far she has kept the two worlds apart. Then one night she finds a barefoot girl standing alone, covered in blood, saying she cannot wake her mother. Three miles away, a jeweler stands in his ransacked shop with a bomb strapped to his chest and millions of pounds gone. The two scenes are connected, and as Phil pulls the threads, the case drags her closer to the world she spent her whole life trying to leave. Her career is at risk. So is her new marriage. So is her life. At the center of it all is the question she has been avoiding since she first put on a uniform: when everything falls apart, does she trust her family or her colleagues, and which side of the law does she actually stand on.
Genres: drama, crime, adult-fiction, psychological-thriller, mystery-thriller
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, morally-complex, suspenseful, tense
Tropes: conflicted-protagonist, family-vs-duty, moral-ambiguity
Setting: London, Metropolitan Police
Period: Contemporary
368 pages · Hardcover · Scribner
Content warnings: murder, violence