Synopses & Reviews
The girl who wouldn't die hunts the killer who shouldn't exist.
"The future is not as loud as war, but it is relentless. It has a terrible fury all its own."
Harper Curtis is a killer who stepped out of the past. Kirby Mazrachi is the girl who was never meant to have a future.
Kirby is the last shining girl, one of the bright young women, burning with potential, whose lives Harper is destined to snuff out after he stumbles on a House in Depression-era Chicago that opens on to other times.
At the urging of the House, Harper inserts himself into the lives of the shining girls, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. He's the ultimate hunter, vanishing into another time after each murder, untraceable-until one of his victims survives.
Determined to bring her would-be killer to justice, Kirby joins the Chicago Sun-Times to work with the ex-homicide reporter, Dan Velasquez, who covered her case. Soon Kirby finds herself closing in on the impossible truth...
The Shining Girls is a masterful twist on the serial killer tale: a violent quantum leap featuring a memorable and appealing heroine in pursuit of a deadly criminal.
Review
"The Shining Girls is utterly original, beautifully written, and I must say, it creeped the holy bejasus out of me. This is something special." Tana French
Review
"A tremendous work of suspense fiction. What's more, it's a fabulous piece of both time-travel and serial killer fiction, using the intersection of those two themes to explore questions of free will, predestination, and causality in a mind-melting, heart-pounding mashup that delivers on its promise." Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing
Review
"I loved The Shining Girls. It really is a new kind of thriller, sitting somewhere between The Time Traveller's Wife and The Silence of The Lambs. A dark, relentless, time-twisting, page-turning murder story guaranteed to give you heart palpitations. It shines." Matt Haig, author of The Radleys
Review
"The Shining Girls is enthralling and dazzlingly inventive. Lauren Beukes risks everything with a startlingly original structure, that's perfectly executed. A huge accomplishment." Deon Meyer
Review
"Very smart." William Gibson
Review
"Imagine Poe and Steinbeck in a knife fight where Poe wins and writes Jack the Ripper's version of The Grapes of Wrath. Lauren Beukes's The Shining Girls is even scarier than that." Richard Kadrey
Synopsis
A masterful twist on the serial killer novel from the award-winning author Lauren Beukes: the girl who wouldn't die hunts the killer who shouldn't exist. Harper Curtis is a killer who stepped out of the past. Kirby Mazrachi is the girl who was never meant to have a future.
Kirby is the last shining girl, one of the bright young women, burning with potential, whose lives Harper is destined to snuff out after he stumbles on a House in Depression-era Chicago that opens on to other times.
At the urging of the House, Harper inserts himself into the lives of these shining girls, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. He's the ultimate hunter, vanishing without a trace into another time after each murder--until one of his victims survives.
Determined to bring her would-be killer to justice, Kirby joins the Chicago Sun-Times to work with the reporter, Dan Velasquez, who covered her case. Soon Kirby finds herself closing in on an impossible truth . . .
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About the Author
Lauren Beukes is the author of the acclaimed novels Moxyland and Zoo City. She is a recipient of the Arthur C. Clarke Award, finished runner-up to Lev Grossman for the John W. Campbell Award, was shortlisted for a plethora of other awards and received rave reviews from around the world including The New York Times and The Guardian. She lives in Cape Town, South Africa with her husband and her daughter.