Fair Play: A Novel [Hardcover]

“Louise Hegarty’s genre-splicing debut is a treat—clever, confident, and always surprising, a mystery story that ingeniously escapes the locked room of the genre to take on the biggest questions of life and death.”—Paul Murray, author of The Bee Sting

For fans of Anthony Horowitz and Lucy Foley, a wonderfully original, genre-breaking literary debut from Ireland that’s an homage to the brilliant detective novels of the early twentieth century, a twisty modern murder mystery, and a searing exploration of grief and loss.

A group of friends gather at an Airbnb on New Year’s Eve. It is Benjamin’s birthday, and his sister Abigail is throwing him a jazz-age Murder Mystery themed party. As the night plays out, champagne is drunk, hors d’oeuvres consumed, and relationships forged, consolidated or frayed. Someone kisses the wrong person; someone else’s heart is broken.

In the morning, all of them wake up—except Benjamin.

As Abigail attempts to wrap her mind around her brother’s death, an eminent detective arrives determined to find Benjamin's killer. In this mansion, suddenly complete with a butler, gardener and housekeeper, everyone is a suspect, and nothing is quite as it seems. 

Will the culprit be revealed? And how can Abigail, now alone, piece herself back together in the wake of this loss?

Gripping and playful, sharp and profoundly moving,Fair Playplumbs the depths of the human heart while subverting one of our most popular genres.

A terrific debut novel. . . . It’s a witty, knowing homage to classic detective fiction, but also a deeply sensitive examination of the loneliness and confusion of grief—and a reminder that every sudden death is a mystery that can’t be fully explained. . . . A bracing meditation on the different ways we perceive death (and fiction).” -