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Gentlemen & Players

Gentlemen & Players

The place is St Oswald's, an old and long-established boys' grammar school in the north of England. A new year has just begun, and for the staff and boys of the school, a wind of unwelcome change is blowing. Suits, paperwork and Information Technology rule the world and Roy Straitley, Latin master, eccentric, and veteran of St Oswald's, is finally - reluctantly - contemplating retirement. But beneath the little rivalries, petty disputes and everyday crises of the school, a darker undercurrent stirs. And a bitter grudge, hidden and carefully nurtured for thirteen years, is about to erupt.

Who is Mole, the mysterious insider, whose cruel practical jokes are gradually escalating towards violence - and perhaps, murder? And how can an old and half-forgotten scandal become the stone that brings down a giant?

Reviews

  • "[A] gripping psychological thriller... Harris is one of our most accomplished novelists and Gentlemen & Players, with its pace, wit and acute observation, shows her at the top of her form"

    DAILY EXPRESS

  • "[A] delicious black comedy ... the plot is so cleverly constructed, the tension so unflagging, you'd think she'd been writing thrillers all her life"

    DAILY MAIL

  • "With a lightness of touch, Harris illuminates just how resentment of privilege and exclusion can lead to violent resolutions... Marvellously mischievous"

    GOOD HOUSEKEEPING

  • "[A] clever story of obsession and revenge... Ms Harris has scored another success"

    SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

  • "A classic whodunnit with the characters carefully crafted and the tension at a knife edge"

    SUNDAY EXPRESS (TOP TEN FICTION 2005)

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About the Author

Joanne Harris

Joanne Harris’s Whitbread-shortlisted Chocolat was made into an Oscar-nominated film starring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp. She is the author of many other bestselling novels, including Lollipop Shoes and Peaches for Monsieur le Curé, both also featuring Vianne Rocher, as is her new novel The Strawberry Thief. She has also written acclaimed novels in such diverse genres as fantasy based on Norse myth (Runemarks, Runelight, The Gospel of Loki), and the Malbry cycle of dark psychological thrillers (Gentlemen & Players, Blueeyedboy, and Different Class). Born in Barnsley, of an English father and a French mother, she spent fifteen years as a teacher before (somewhat reluctantly) becoming a full-time writer. In 2013, she was awarded an MBE. She lives in Yorkshire, plays bass and flute in a band first formed when she was sixteen, and works in a shed in her garden.

Joanne Harris

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Features

Joanne Harris on the secrets and drama of school days

Joanne Harris returns to St Oswald’s Grammar School in Different Class, the third in a series of novels that sees the school on the brink of ruin. Her letter to her readers sets the scene

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