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by William Boyle
When a young woman with a sordid past witnesses a murder, she finds herself fascinated by the killer and decides to track him down herself.
Amy was once a party girl, but she now lives a lonely life, helping the house-bound to receive communion in the Gravesend neighborhood of Brooklyn. She stops in at one of the apartments on her route, where Mrs. Epifanio, the elderly woman who lives there, says she hasn't seen her usual caretaker, Diane, in a few days. Supposedly, Diane has the flu - or so Diane's son Vincent said when he first dropped by and vanished into Mrs. E's bedroom to do no-one-knows-what.
Amy's brief interaction with Vincent in the apartment that day sets off warning bells, so she assures Mrs. E that she'll find out what's really going on with both him and his mother. She tails Vincent through Brooklyn, eventually following him and a mysterious man out of a local dive bar. At first, the men are only talking as they walk, but then, almost before Amy can register what has happened, Vincent is dead.
For reasons she can't quite understand, Amy finds herself captivated by both the crime she witnessed and the murderer himself. She doesn't call the cops to report what she's seen. Instead, she collects the murder weapon from the sidewalk and soon finds herself on the trail of a killer.
Character-driven and evocative, The Lonely Witness brings Brooklyn to life in a way only a native can, and opens readers' eyes to the harsh realities of crime and punishment on the city streets.
"Starred Review. Powered by brilliantly realized characters, a richly described and grittily realistic backdrop, and subtle yet powerful imagery, this is crime fiction at its best: immersive, intense, and darkly illuminating." - Publishers Weekly
"Stared Review. Once a party girl, Amy now lives a solitary existence. This remarkable discordance is riveting, especially after Amy witnesses a murder and becomes at once traumatized by the crime and obsessed with the murderer...Boyle was featured in a Guardian write-up that compared him to Elmore Leonard and declared him a 'new name to watch.' That watching continues with this outstanding thriller." - Booklist
"The Lonely Witness is a map of Brooklyn's genome. Amy Falconetti is that rarest of noir characters, a woman redeemed and a redeemer. Walking in her shoes for only a few blocks is worth the price of admission." - Reed Farrel Coleman New York Times bestselling author of What You Break
"In true noir fashion, William Boyle gives us an intimate portrait of a neighborhood in vivid, evocative prose, and explores how place and the past make us who we are. The Lonely Witness moves with unstoppable momentum, powered by Amy Falconetti's impulsive human heart. I would gladly follow her anywhere." - Melissa Ginsburg, author of Sunset City
"In The Lonely Witness, William Boyle has created a classic noir and a classic of Brooklyn. I loved this character, this world, and this book. Boyle has written a slim, unputdownable book that gets into every dark corner in the outskirts of Brooklyn, a world no one knows better. Gravesend and the rest of outer, unknown, still-mysterious Brooklyn shine in this compulsively readable thriller." - Sara Gran, author of Dope, Come Closer, Saturn's Return to New York, and the Claire DeWitt series
"As Amy's old life catches up with her, the small, safe world she's built for herself quickly unravels. Binge-worthy and gorgeously written, with prose so vivid it's as if Boyle is taking you down streets you've known your entire life, The Lonely Witness will make you wonder if you can ever escape your past self, or if you'd even want to." - Mary Miller, author of Big World, The Last Days of California, and Always Happy Hour
This information about The Lonely Witness was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
William Boyle is from Brooklyn, New York. His debut novel, Gravesend, was published as #1,000 in the Rivages/Noir collection in France, where it was shortlisted for the Prix Polar SNCF 2017 and nominated for the Grand Prix de Littérature Policière. Boyle is also the author of a book of short stories, Death Don't Have No Mercy, and of another novel, Tout est Brisé, recently released in France by Gallmeister. He lives in Oxford, Mississippi.
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