Price range: £5.99 through £9.99
Buck, aka Michael Fineday, aka Red Deer is on his way to track down his wayward brother in the Twin Cities, when he’s trapped in a snowstorm and rescued by Sally, a girl who is fighting her own demons. Though intrigued by Sally, most of Buck’s time is spent trying to unravel his family’s involvement with an elaborate racket which has recently gotten his cousin Ruben and his half-brother Bear killed.
Eli, Buck’s surviving brother, is up to his neck in the racket that involves insurance fraud and stolen vehicles, and unwilling to tell Buck the truth. The racketeer’s kingpin thinks Eli has something they want – which is both his death warrant and his salvation. The problem is, Eli doesn’t know exactly what that something is or how to find it; his only clue is a phrase in Anishinaabe language Ruben scrawled on the wall of his room before he was killed, and it’s up to Buck to track it down.
Meanwhile, Sally and Buck grow closer through the shared wounds of their difficult pasts; and Buck teaches her some Ashinaabe language and cultural practices. Strangely, all roads – both Sally’s and Buck’s – lead to the Witch Tree, an important spiritual reservoir in Native American religion, and where he is forced to face the many facets of his own identity and find a way for them both to heal.
“Right from the opening chapter, where the narrator wakes up with no memory of who she is, The Glass Woman instantly hooks you with a timely take on the rise of AI, and burrows under your skin. It manages to be both a deliciously creepy and mysterious thriller and also a thought-provoking meditation on identity and memory. Hugely entertaining and relentlessly readable.”
– Alex Michaelides, bestselling author of The Silent Patient
“Stepford Wives meets 2001 Space Odyssey, The Glass Woman is a twisty, thought-provoking read with characters full of heart engaging with the debate around AI in a truly inventive and original way.”
– Chris MacDonald, author of Happily Ever After and The Actor
“More than simply a psychological thriller, The Glass Woman is a chilling invitation to witness what might be our future. The science is well-researched and completely believable. A novel that stayed in my mind long after I read the final page. The definition of a thought-provoking read.”
– Julie Corbin, author of Whispers of a Scandal
“McIlroy packs a lot into this slim novel, calling into question the permanence of memory, the infallibility of technology, and the trustworthiness of those we love. Taking central themes of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Severance, and Dennis Lehane’s Shutter Island to new dramatic heights, McIlroy’s well-paced novel will keep readers guessing until the final pages.”
– Booklist
“Completely absorbing, I haven’t been able to put it down.”
– Sarah Ward, author of The Birthday Girl and The Sixth Lie
“Raises fascinating questions about consciousness and its relation to objective and subjective reality.”
“A twisty psychological thriller that plays on our current fears about AI as well as ideas about memory, trauma and the self.”
– The Guardian
“A successful example of the genre with a chilling modern feel.”
– The Critic
“The Glass Woman is that too-rare a beast – an urgent thriller with solid intellectual underpinning.”
– Shots Magazine
“McIlroy’s sharp sci-fi thriller debut is one part Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and two parts Black Mirror… raising salient questions about the ethics of AI. This will keep readers up late.”
– Publishers Weekly
