The Hiding Place | Fiction - www.zzdbook.com

The Hiding Place

Jun 26, 2025 10:30 PM

Author:David Bell

The Hiding Place

A wonderful treat for all fans of the novels by Kate Atkinson and Dennis Lehane, David Bell's The Hiding Place is a powerful psychological suspense thriller which unravels the secrets of a damaged family in small town America.

Sometimes it's easier to believe a lie . . .

Twenty-five-years ago, four-year-old Justin Manning disappeared. Two months later his body was found in a shallow grave in the woods, shocking the small town of Dove Point, Ohio.

Janet Manning has been haunted by her brother's death since the day she lost sight of him in the park. Now, a detective and a reporter are asking questions, raising new suspicions and opening old wounds. But if the man jailed for the murder is innocent, who did kill Justin?

At the same time a stranger appears at Janet's door claiming to know the truth and a high school friend returns, with his own confused memories of what happened. Janet thought she'd put the past and guilt behind her. But now the truth about her brother is heartbreakingly close - has she the courage to find it?

Immerse yourself in David Bell's wonderfully gripping UK debut The Hiding Place and unravel the truth which lies buried in Janet's past...

David Bell is an assistant professor of English at Western Kentucky University. He received an M.A. in creative writing from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and a Ph.D. in American Literature and creative writing from the University of Cincinnati. Cemetery Girl was David Bell's first novel - The Hiding Place is his second.

Praise for David Bell's Cemetery Girl:

'David Bell writes spellbinding and gripping thrillers that get under your skin and refuse to let go' Linwood Barclay

'Reads like a collaboration between Michael Connelly and the gothic fiction of Joyce Carol Oates . . . A winner on every level' Will Lavender

'A haunting meditation on the ties that bind parent to child, husband to wife, brother to brother. An absolutely riveting, absorbing read not to be missed' Lisa Unger

Reviews

Reads like a collaboration between Michael Connelly and the gothic fiction of Joyce Carol Oates . . . A winner on every level

—— Will Lavender

Cemetery Girl grabbed me by the throat on page one and never let up. . . the work of a master

—— John Lescroart

A haunting meditation on the ties that bind parent to child, husband to wife, brother to brother. An absolutely riveting, absorbing read not to be missed

—— Lisa Unger

Stolen Souls is another winner from a a man who's rapidly establishing himself as a top-notch thriller writer. Great stuff

—— Simon Kernick

Neville creates a break-neck pace as he switches between the story's different strands in punchy chapters...good, grisly fun

—— Siobhan Murphy , Metro

Unputdownable and seriously good. Fasten your seatbelt and climb into this rollercoaster of a book

—— Eurocrime

Neville is a master at constructing monsters and this latest is no exception... The best measure of a genre novel is its readability and this one sticks to the hands

—— Chris Moss , Time Out

Stolen Souls shows an unflinching mastery of such dark and disturbing material ... A master at work

—— Henry Sutton , Mirror

This third, beautifully crafted thriller, which brings Inspector Jack Lennon to the fore, confirms [Stuart Neville's] stature as the North's most promising crime fiction talent.

—— Irish Independent

The Irish crime-fiction wave rises to new heights with Stuart Neville's third novel, the tight, telescopic thriller Stolen Souls. The writing here is mature and assured: There are no extraneous words or characters... But where Ellroy writes a furious caldron of nonstop vintage action, one senses a diamond-hard stillness at the heart of Neville's prose, despite the hurtling plot

—— Denise Hamilton , Los Angeles Times

Stuart Neville's mastery of Belfast continues... Spectacularly written

—— Marcel Berlins , The Times

Neville's third outing confirms him as the king of Belfast noir

—— John O'Connell , Guardian

A stir-fry of death and addiction

—— Tom Adair , Scotland on Sunday

Scary, but always humane

—— Joan Smith , The Sunday Times

This guy can write.

—— James Ellroy

Neville has the talent to believably blend the tropes of the crime novel and those of a horror, in the process creating a page-turning thriller akin to a collaboration between John Connolly and Stephen King...

—— The Sunday Independent

A brilliant thriller: unbearably tense, stomach-churningly frightening.

—— The Observer

A no-frills thriller that barrels along at a ferocious pace, pausing only to offer the occasional nod to 1970s paranoid classics such as William Goldman's Marathon Man.

—— Declan Burke , Irish Times

Stuart Neville's third novel effortlessly exceeds the high expectations created by the first two installments... Stuart Neville's latest novel is a thrilling masterpiece. From its gripping and well paced plot to its well defined and intriguing characters, Stolen Souls is a powerful novel, which does not shy away from exploring the new literary landscape for Northern Irish fiction.

—— Kellie Chambers , Ulster Tatler

Belinda Bauer's thrillers are always compelling, always original, always brilliant. I will rush to read anything she writes

—— Mark Billingham

Bold and original, Rubbernecker draws you into unexpected psychological territory with its sophisticated, fast-paced story. A thought-provoking page-turner you won't be able to put down.

—— KOETHI ZAN, author of The Never List

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