Holding

A New York Times bestseller

From Graham Nortonthe BAFTA Awardwinning and hugely popular BBC America television hostcomes a charming debut novel set in an idyllic Irish village where a bumbling investigator has to sort through decades of gossip and secrets to solve a mysterious crime. ';With its tale of provincial life, gimlet-eyed spinsters, and thwarted loveit feels almost like a Miss Marple mystery written by Colm Tibn' (The New York Times).

The remote Irish village of Duneen has known little drama, and yet its inhabitants are troubled: Sergeant P.J. Collins hasn't always been this overweight; Brid Riordan, a mother of two, hasn't always been an alcoholic; and elegant Evelyn Ross hasn't always felt that her life was a total waste.

So when human remainssuspected to be those of Tommy Burke, a former lover of both Brid and Evelynare discovered on an old farm, the village's dark past begins to unravel. As a frustrated P.J. struggles to solve a genuine case for the first time in his professional life, he unearths a community's worth of anger and resentments, secrets and regrets.

Darkly comic, at times profoundly sad, and ';especially inviting because of its tongue-in-cheek wit' (Kirkus Reviews), Holding is a masterful debut. Graham Norton employs his acerbic humor to breathe life into a host of lovable characters, and explorewith searing honestythe complexities and contradictions that make us human.