Age 13+

This novel is set in the world of modelling, but it is much more than fantasy fulfilment for wannabe catwalkers. It is an intelligent murder mystery with a realistic sense of how exploitative the fashion industry can be. It interweaves two stories that take place 16 years apart, and which come cleverly together in a tense denouement. One concerns plain, sensible Nessa, daughter of fashion designer Helena whose life is trivial and affected. Nessa befriends a beautiful, damaged 15-year-old model and discovers the dark side of her mother’s milieu — its connections with the underworld. The second story follows Nessa’s foster-daughter Lauren, and her discovery by a top model agency that connects her with the sinister legacy of her own parentage. This is a book about friendship, falling in love, corrupt old men who mistreat young girls and, memorably, London: it is full of detail of real places — street markets, trendy watering holes, gangland haunts, Thameside beaches and arts venues. And the book is peopled, like the city, with characters of spectacular variety: black, white and mixed race, high-living, low-living, politicised, apathetic, ugly and beautiful.

(OUP £4.99)

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