True Crime Story

'A triumph. Dazzlingly original' Sunday Times 
'Riveting and relentless...A unique story, brilliantly told' Terry Hayes 
'Brilliant, compelling and original' Steve Cavanagh 
'Highly original and mischievous' John Boyne 
______________ 
 
'What happens to those girls who go missing? What happens to the Zoe Nolans of the world?' 
 
In the early hours of Saturday 17 December 2011, Zoe Nolan, a nineteen-year-old Manchester University student, walked out of a party taking place in the shared accommodation where she had been living for three months. 
 
She was never seen again. 
 
Seven years after her disappearance, struggling writer Evelyn Mitchell finds herself drawn into the mystery. Through interviews with Zoe's closest friends and family, she begins piecing together what really happened in 2011. But where some versions of events overlap, aligning perfectly with one another, others stand in stark contrast, giving rise to troubling inconsistencies. 
 
Shaken by revelations of Zoe's secret life, and stalked by a figure from the shadows, Evelyn turns to crime writer Joseph Knox to help make sense of a case where everyone has something to hide. 
 
Zoe Nolan may be missing presumed dead, but her story is only just beginning. 
______________ 
 
Readers love TRUE CRIME STORY: 
 
'Perfectly combines the best parts of true crime, fiction and mystery. Superb' 
'My favourite read of 2021...fascinating, perplexing and bloody brilliant' 
'I've been looking for something different and new in the crime genre. Here it is'

Scandalously entertaining...Knox is a fantastic writer. His ambitious fourth novel satirises and celebrates the true-crime genre with glee ... by turns horrific and hilarious

Truly immersive: complex, disturbing, unexpectedly funny and very smart

One of the most engaging cold-case novels I have read

Knox the author pulls off a hybrid triumph: at once an old-fashioned whodunnit and a smart postmodern literary novel asking questions about the ethics of all editing, as well as the true-crime genre.  Dazzlingly original.

The gifted Joseph Knox continues his upwards trajectory...forging something original and innovative.

Best new fiction. Knox tears up the rule book, this bravura performance it's darkness leavened by very black humour

This satire of the true crime genre is ingenious, funny and totally original

Reads like a cinematic true crime documentary. Brilliant, compelling and original.

An absolute triumph. It sucked me in, chewed me up, spat me out and left me blinking like the moment the lights go on at a fuzzy basement nightclub. Phenomenal, current, bleakly devastating. An iron gauntlet in the guts. Loved it.

Highly original and mischievous novel - a complete triumph

Absolutely brilliant. I think it's a game-changer

Pure genius - all the things you want to a crime novel to be, also hilarious. I love it

True Crime Story is phenomenal. One of the most original thrillers I've read in years, perhaps ever. A gritty, twisted murder mystery told in the unique style of a true crime account. I've rarely raced through a book so fast. I'm just gutted that it's probably ruined me for thrillers for a good long while! Absolutely remarkable.

WOW ! this is a work of outstanding and staggering genius! You always get beautiful prose and a crackling plot from Mr Knox. But this has extra madness. It's the most original book I've read in ages

The most exciting and original crime book you'll read this year

Dark, seedy, and not to be trusted, and that's just the character Joseph Knox, as written by Joseph Knox!This is a very clever book indeed. Fiction so convincingly written as true crime that I ended up Googling the victim just to check I hadn't got the wrong end of the stick.

Totally gripping, original, and white- hot suspenseful

One of the most unafraid contemporary crime writers ... a genre defying complex construct of smoke and mirrors, this book is very, very clever.

A story that'll leave your head spinning and questioning just who gets to shape the narrative when a woman goes missing...

Supple and urgent - another slab of Knox brilliance

Knox has produced something extraordinary ... post-modern playfulness [embedded] in a rich and compelling plot that twists and turns until the final pages

Astonishing! So clever, so original! Highly recommended

This clever novel reads like a true crime story (at times you have to remind yourself it's fiction), which makes it all the more compelling

A very stylish novel revealing not only the unreliability of witnesses, but also the voyeurism in much crime reporting, crime investigation, and yes, in those of us who enjoy crime fiction

Book of the year 
 True Crime Story by Joseph Knox, a provocative mix of real and fictional crime in which the author himself investigates the disappearance of a student named Zoe. But is she a real or fictional character? With a fragmentary narrative style, this is something new in the overcrowded crime genre

Joseph Knox cements his reputation as one of the best of the new guard of British crime writers with True Crime Story, in which one Joseph Knox - a deliciously unflattering self-portrait - becomes entangled in the investigation into the disappearance of a student. It's a meta-fictional trick that helps to create a genuine (and genuinely pleasurable) sense of unease.

Joseph Knox has lived in Stoke on Trent, Manchester and London. In 2020, he became an Irish citizen. His debut novel Sirens was a bestseller and has been translated into eighteen languages. The Smiling Man and The Sleepwalker are the second and third books in the Waits trilogy. His first standalone novel, True Crime Story, was a Times number one bestseller.

'What happens to those girls who go missing? What happens to the Zoe Nolans of the world?' 
 
In the early hours of Saturday, December 17th, 2011, Zoe Nolan, a 19-year-old Manchester University student, walked out of a party taking place in the shared accommodation where she had been living for three months. 
 
She was never seen again.

The Sleepwalker

The dark and addictive thriller

Detective Aidan Waits is a troubled junior detective haunted by his past. Facing an uncertain future, and disconnected from his history, DC Waits and his partner, Detective Inspector Peter 'Sutty' Sutcliffe work on Manchester's streets to uncover the city's worst criminals among the grime of the underworld.

Detective Aidan Waits has one job: to extract the location of Martin Wick’s final victim before he passes away. But Wick’s whispered final words tell of a contract killer at work…and Aidan's name is next on the list.

‘Knox’s pitch-black novels are among crime fiction’s most compelling’

‘Fierce, funny and flint-sharp. Joseph Knox is the true grit of Brit noir'

Dark, gritty and compelling, this will have you turning the pages until the early hours of the morning

Oozing dread, full of surprises and with a powerful sense of outraged humanity, The Sleepwalker is Joseph Knox’s finest novel yet.

‘[An] ingenious plot … full of striking revelations’

Unflinching, fearsomely realistic, superb...The Aidan Waits series has the makings of a classic of the genre.

Knox is proving to be amongst the most pithy of British crime writers, and his exuberant novels are among the best in the current field

mesmerizing depictions of Manchester by night; a plot that is baroque in its shimmering complexity and overall, an hallucinatory power that borders on the uncanny

brilliant ... displays all the virtues of a high-energy police procedural while being spiritually and tonally in thrall to classic PI fiction, with a cumulative hallucinatory power that borders on the uncanny.

The Sunday Express, Thrillers of the Year

‘He said he didn’t remember killing them…’ 
 
As a series of rolling blackouts plunge the city into darkness, Detective Aidan Waits sits on an abandoned hospital ward, watching a mass murderer slowly die. Transferred from his usual night shift duties and onto protective custody, he has just one job… 
 
To extract the location of Martin Wick’s final victim before the notorious mass murderer passes away. 
 
Wick has spent over a decade in prison, in near-total silence, having confessed to an unspeakable crime that shocked the nation and earned him the nickname of The Sleepwalker. 
 
But when a daring premeditated attack leaves one police officer dead and another one fighting for his life, Wick’s whispered last words will send Waits on a journey into the heart of darkness… 
 
Manipulated by a reticent psychopath from his past, and under investigation from his new partner, Detective Constable Naomi Black, Waits realises too late that a remorseless contract killer is at work. 
 
Can Aidan Waits solve his last case before fleeing justice? 
 
Or will his name be next on the hit list?

The Smiling Man

How do you solve the murder of a man who doesn't exist? Detective Aidan Waits returns in a brilliantly gritty crime novel.

If you liked Sirens, you will love The Smiling Man. Gritty, noir, and packing a punch from the very first page.

Gritty as hell. I loved it! A great urban cop thriller

Sirens was one of the best books published last year and this intense, blackly comic follow-up is just as good. Joseph Knox has conjured up a sense of evil and corruption you can almost smell it.

Imperfect as Aidan Waits is, the Manchester DC is the shining light in a world peopled by the worst kinds of bad people. This is Knox's second Waits book in what holds the promise of a classic series.

Talents such as Knox rarely emerge more than once in a generation. A crime fiction masterpiece

If you like your crime fiction dark, gritty an contemporary, then Joseph Knox’s latest novel is for you . . .  dripping with dark humour, written with style, a dark and engrossing ride through the mean streets of Manchester

Although nominally a police procedural, The Smiling Man has the sense of place and vivid atmosphere of a classic PI novel. .. Stylish, intelligent and full of heart, Joseph Knox is the best thing to have happened to English crime fiction in years.

You can trace Aidan Waits's lineage direct from Marlowe through Bosch and Rebus — maverick sleuth with a savagely poetic turn of phrase that packs serious observation of the human condition under the laughs — though Waits has the self-sabotage knob turned up to 11. Imperfect as he is, the Manchester DC is the shining light in a world peopled by the worst kinds of bad people. This is Knox's second Waits book in what holds the promise of a classic series.

Razor-sharp urban noir – very special indeed.

Sirens is a powerhouse of noir. Joseph Knox owns Manchester and paints it in all its grimy colours.

Manchester throbs with lowlife in this startling debut . . . a page-turner with a beating heart. I loved it.

Waits’ first fictional outing is a shadowy, disturbing narrative and once you start reading it’s hard to resist the call. Sirens is the best British crime debut of the last five years.

A fierce, assured and utterly compelling debut . . . A Ross MacDonald for the 21st century.

Great read. A powerful piece of Manchester noir, brutal, poignant and dark as tar.

Fresh and darkly stylish, Sirens is a striking debut that marks the arrival of a major new crime writing talent.

Sirens immediately feels like a classic, not a debut . . . a book for every crime fan.

Julia Heaberlin, author of Black Eyed Susans

An amazing thriller. Sexy, stylish suspense.

A dark, dangerous noir, Sirens will be one of 2017’s smash hit debuts.

________ 
 
‘Gritty as hell. I loved it. A great urban cop thriller’ Ian Rankin 
 
As heard on BBC Radio 5 Live Phil Williams Show 
 
From the bestselling author of Sirens, Detective Aidan Waits is on the hunt to find the identity of The Smiling Man. 
________ 
 
A body has been found on the fourth floor of Manchester’s vast and empty Palace Hotel. The man is dead. And he is smiling. 
 
The tags have been removed from his clothes. His teeth have been replaced. Even his fingertips are not his own. Only a patch sewn into his trousers offers any information about him. 
 
Detective Aidan Waits and his unwilling partner, DI Sutcliffe, must piece together the scant clues to identify the stranger. But as they do, Aidan realises that a ghost from his past haunts the investigation. He soon recognises that to discover who the smiling man really is, he must first confront the scattered debris of his own life . . . 
________ 
 
'Talents such as Knox rarely emerge more than once in a generation. A crime fiction masterpiece' ***** Metro 
 
'Packing a punch from the very first page. You will love The Smiling Man' Jane Harper, author of The Dry

Sirens

Aidan Waits Series Book 1

Sirens is the brooding and assured debut from Joseph Knox, the next big name in crime fiction.

Knox presents the city as pungently and uncompromisingly as Ian Rankin does Edinburgh

A firecracker of a crime tale. His writing is taut, atmospheric and studded with eye-catching descriptions. An arresting new talent.

The dark, gritty underbelly of Manchester is captured with eviscerating authenticity in this debut . . . This is urban noir at its freshest and most ferocious.

A noir in that great tradition of the American writers James M Cain and Dashiel Hammet . . . it reminded me a bit of Chandler’s LA, the whole city is corrupt, the authority figures are as bad as the criminals.

Jumps straight into the top league of English noir.

This is an excellent read; it feels both classic and completely new and is remarkably assured for a first outing.

A down and dirty slice of Manchester noir . . . Impressively bleak.

Page-turner is the only word for it.

Brooding, blistering. Sirens is a remarkable literary thriller, perfect for fans of Ian Rankin and James Lee Burke

A.J. Finn, bestselling author of The Woman in the Window

‘Brooding, blistering. Sirens is a remarkable literary thriller, perfect for fans of Ian Rankin and James Lee Burke’ AJ Finn, author of The Woman in the Window 
 
 
WATERSTONES THRILLER OF THE MONTH 
 
I stopped going to work. I went missing. We still live in a world where you can disappear if you want to. Or even if you don't. 
 
Detective Aidan Waits is in trouble 
 
After a career-ending mistake, he’s forced into a nightmare undercover operation that his superiors don’t expect him to survive. 
 
Isabelle Rossiter has run away again 
 
When the teenage daughter of a prominent MP joins Zain Carver, the enigmatic criminal who Waits is investigating, everything changes. 
 
A single mother, missing for a decade 
 
Carver is a mesmerising figure who lures young women into his orbit – young women who have a bad habit of disappearing. Soon Waits is cut loose by the police, stalked by an unseen killer and dangerously attracted to the wrong woman. 
 
How can he save the girl, when he can’t even save himself? 
 
 
* 
 
Reader reviews: 
 
'It is an utterly brilliant debut novel; dark, gritty, menacing and meaningful.' ***** 
 
'Compulsive reading, so well written that even the gruesome cruelty and sense of helplessness in a dark world seemed right.'***** 
 
'Knox is always one-step ahead, deceiving the reader and creating a sexy, stylish world always with danger around every corner.' ***** 
 
* 
 
The bestselling debut from the winner of the Sky Arts Writer of the Year Award, the next big name in crime fiction - Joseph Knox.

King Leer

Once you know the secret, it all falls into place… 
 
Lynch’s history as a con artist makes him a natural missing persons investigator. He’s just as comfortable telling lies as he is at spotting them. He’s also had to disappear once or twice, himself. 
 
But when Lynch gets a desperate call about a runaway girl, he’s confused. Miles Cathey, the man on the phone, is the director of a state-funded care home for teens. Why wouldn’t he just go to the police? 
 
As Lynch learns more about Simbi, the missing girl, as well as her mother, Ayo — who was shot dead on her doorstep in broad daylight, four years ago — he quickly sees why Cathey can’t trust the cops… 
 
Ayo was a film-maker who’d been working on a controversial documentary at the time of her death. King Leer was billed as the shocking exposé of a high-profile sexual predator, operating with apparent impunity. But when Ayo died, her raw footage was seized by a team of lawyers. The film was quietly cancelled and never aired. 
 
Now, Lynch needs to get his hands on the last remaining copy of King Leer. He’s got to catch up with Simbi before her mother’s killer can. Most importantly, he’s got to know… 
 
…Who are they trying to protect?

Joseph Knox

Truly immersive: complex, disturbing, unexpectedly funny and very smart.

Fierce, funny and flint-sharp. Joseph Knox is the true grit of Brit noir.

'When you’re living a lie, you find it’s best to avoid close attachments…’ 
 
Lynch, a burned out con-artist, arrives, broke, in London, trying not to dwell on the mistakes that got him there. When he bumps into Bobbie, a rehab-bound heiress - and when she briefly mistakes him for her missing brother - Lynch senses the opportunity, as well as the danger… 
 
Bobbie’s brother, Heydon, was a troubled young man. Five years ago, he walked out of the family home and never went back. His car was found parked on a bridge overlooking the Thames, in the early hours of the same morning. Unsettled by Bobbie’s story, and suffering from a rare attack of conscience, Lynch tries to back off. 
 
But when Bobbie leaves for rehab the following day, he finds himself drawn to her luxurious family home, and into a meeting with her mother, the formidable Miranda. Seeing the same resemblance that her daughter did, Miranda proposes she hire Lynch to assume her son’s identity, in a last-ditch effort to try and flush out his killer. 
 
As Lynch begins to impersonate him, dark forces are lured out of the shadows, and he realises too late that Heydon wasn’t paranoid at all. Someone was watching his every move, and they’ll kill to keep it a secret. 
 
For the first time, Lynch is in a life or death situation he can’t lie his way out of.

Joseph Knox

Books by Joseph Knox

Series by Joseph Knox

Aidan Waits

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