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Estate agents have come in for their fair share of criticism since we all gained post-bubble 20/20 hindsight vision. UK novelist Phil Hogan goes a step further, casting protagonist William Heming as a disturbed, and disturbing, estate agent whose obsessive curiosity about the lives of his clients strays beyond the professional and into the criminal. The events of Heming's youth that created such an unwholesome mind are revealed gradually through flashbacks. Hogan pulls off a difficult trick in the creation of a character who is repugnant, without turning the reader off. Creepy as he is, you can't help but want to see what Heming will do next. Pacey and well-plotted, this unsettling psychological thriller taps into the current rage for "domestic noir" books without being derivative, and will fill the gap for readers who have torn through the big hits in the genre.
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