Darren Shan is best known for his taut books for older teenagers, but he is rapidly proving he has the adult market sewn up too. In Lady of the Shades he brings an American minor thriller author to London in search of a plot for his latest foray into the Stephen King-style supernatural.

Instead he meets a beautiful woman and falls for her, only to find out that she has lied about her name and is the abused wife of a jealous and ruthless mobster. But then the man whose literary pseudonym is Ed Sieveking hasn’t exactly been telling the truth about his past either.

Shan gives us a tale of multiple deceptions, of human beings haunted by the ghosts of their past and stalked by the consequences of their actions in the present. Absolutely gripping from first page to last.