The New York Times' #1 Thriller of 2024

'Highsmithian... highly readable, twisty and shrewd' HANYA YANAGIHARA (on Instagram), author of A Little Life

'Atmospheric, diabolical fun' LUCY FOLEY, author of The Midnight Feast

'Disturbingly enjoyable' EMMA HEALEY, author of Elizabeth is Missing

'A taut, wicked masterpiece' MONA AWAD, author of Bunny

Eighty-one-year-old Maggie Burkhardt has left it all behind and spent the last five years ping-ponging between the world's luxury hotels.

Now she has finally come to rest somewhere she can imagine staying forever: the Royal Karnak Hotel in Luxor, Egypt.

Maggie is no sweet old lady. She has a nasty, nosy little habit: she spies on her fellow guests and manipulates situations to 'liberate' them from what she sees as unhappy relationships.

When an eight-year-old boy, Otto, and his well-meaning mother arrive at the hotel, Maggie sees two easy targets. But she is more wrong than she could possibly know, and is soon locked in a death-spiral with Otto - has she finally met her match in a child one-tenth her age?

Crackling with the perceptive acid wit of The White Lotusand haloed by Shirley Jackson's cruel, dark magic, Christopher Bollen's new novel is a decadent and ghastly delight.

Early readers are saying...

'Absolutely brilliant and insane. I went in knowing very little about the book and I'm glad because it made it even more of a wild ride' ¿¿¿¿¿

'I loved this book from the first page... The conflict between the old and the young in this cat and mouse tussle is brilliant. It's a hard to put down novel and has a great twist at the end' ¿¿¿¿¿

'I had an absolute blast reading this. Otto and Maggie are wild characters and their behavior is shocking!' ¿¿¿¿