Isobel Dixon has sold North American rights at auction to Siobhan Macdonald’s psychological thriller TWISTED RIVER to Emily Murdock Baker at Viking Penguin.

Baker said: ‘It’s so gripping and page turning, so tightly plotted. It’s fantastic, and I know it will make a great addition to the Penguin list. I think TWISTED RIVER would appeal to the same readership as THE SILENT WIFE and the Edgar Award-winning THE WICKED GIRLS.’

A compelling new ‘marriage noir’ set in Manhattan and Limerick, TWISTED RIVER tells the story of a dream holiday house-swap that goes tragically wrong. Kate and Mannix O'Brien live with their two children in a quirky house overlooking the Curragower Falls on the Shannon River in Limerick – a city where the haves and have-nots live side by side. Meanwhile, on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, the Harveys own a fashionable brownstone on Riverside Drive. For their family vacations this year, they’ve both booked in for a house-swap – and it’s one they will never forget. At the novel’s start, Oscar Harvey is opening the trunk of the car his hosts have loaned him – and finds the body of a woman. From this shocking beginning the story spools back to roots of the house swap, taking us on a gripping journey that never lets up.

Siobhan’s novel THE BLUE POOL was published in Germany by Piper last month.

Born in Cork, Siobhan studied in Galway, worked as a technical writer in Scotland for ten years, then in France, before returning to Ireland. She lives in Limerick with her husband and two sons.