“British crime reporter Mark’s outstanding first novel, a suspenseful whodunit…Readers will want to see more of the complicated McAvoy, who well serves a sophisticated and disturbing plot.”
—Publishers Weekly, Starred review
“THE DARK WINTER is an exceptional debut from an exciting new talent. David Mark is an original and captivating new voice.”
—Val McDermid
“Fast moving and tightly plotted, with strong characterization and a likeable protagonist, this is an extremely promising debut.”
—The Guardian (UK)
“THE DARK WINTER is a promising debut by David Mark… certainly provides a trip to Hull and back.”
—The Telegraph (UK), in its “Best Recent Crime and Thrillers” section)
“THE DARK WINTER is a fantastic debut of a police procedural series that takes place in northern England… David Mark has developed his characters so completely that the reader can almost put himself in the mind of McAvoy as he is connecting dots that no one else even sees.”
—Nancy McFarlane, Fiction Addiction
“An unusual and accomplished debut with tight plotting and intelligent writing. Mark credits his grandparents with being ‘champion storytellers’ and he’s clearly inherited the gene.”
—The Daily Mail
About The Book
What Ian Rankin is to Edinburgh, David Mark is to Hull, the northern England port as old and mysterious as its bordering sea. There, a series of suspicious deaths have captured the attention of Detective Sergeant Aector McAvoy, whose keen intelligence leads him to notice a pattern missed by others: All of the victims were at one time the sole survivors of tragedies large and small. As McAvoy strives to connect the cases to a single culprit, he is continually torn between his duties and his aching desire to spend more time with his wife and child—both of whom he adores. In McAvoy, Mark has created an unforgettable hero: a family guy obsessed with being a decent cop, a physically imposing man far more comfortable exploring databases than being gung-ho with his muscle.
The Dark Winter is the start of a police series that will rank among the classics of our time.
About The Author
DAVID MARK has been a journalist for fifteen years, including seven years as crime reporter for the Yorkshire Post in its Hull office. THE DARK WINTER, the first in the Detective Sergeant Aector McAvoy series, is his fiction debut.