I’m so grateful to the whole team at HarperCollins including my amazing editor, Julia Wisdom, her brilliant team including Kathryn Cheshire, Finn Cotton and Phoebe Morgan, Charlie Redmayne, the lovely Kate Elton, Hannah O’Brien, Fliss Denham, Katy Blott and everyone else who has contributed so much hard work on my behalf. I’d also like to thank the wonderful team in the HarperCollins Dublin office, especially Tony Purdue, Ciara Swift, Patricia McVeigh and Jacq Murphy. Anne O’Brien provided astute insights, as usual, when copy-editing the book, and Charlotte Webb proofread the book with great care and attention to detail.
A special thank you to my exceptional agent, Ariella Feiner, her superb assistant Molly Jamieson, wonder-agent Sarah Ballard and the whole team at United Agents for looking after me so well.
I get tremendous support from booksellers and librarians in the UK and Ireland. Bookshops and libraries seem to me to be the essence of a civilised society and they are worth cherishing: use them whenever you can.
In researching The Cutting Place, I spent a morning on the Thames foreshore, mudlarking under the supervision of the Thames Explorer Trust. The Shard is the highest point you can currently observe London from; the foreshore is the lowest. It gave me a new perspective on the city and on my book. (Many of Maeve’s stupider questions in the first chapter were based on the questions I asked our infinitely patient guide. Any mistakes are, of course, mine.)
I am so lucky to be part of the close-knit and kind crime-writing community, including the Killer Women and other friends who are genuinely too numerous to list. For their great support and friendship I must mention Liz Nugent, Sinéad Crowley, Catherine Ryan Howard, Andrea/Andy Carter, Patricia Gibney, Hazel Gaynor, Carmel Harrington, Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin, Bert Wright, Maire Logue, Bob and Marta from the Gutter Bookshop, Pat Kenny, and Rick O’Shea for running a wonderful book club among his many other duties. Susie Steiner, Sarah Hilary, Erin Kelly, Colette McBeth, Tammy Cohen, Amanda Jennings and Ruth Ware are frequently my shoulders of choice to cry on: wise and brilliant authors all. Also a massive thank you is due to the Lord Peter Wimsey Casting Club (Harriet Evans, Sarah Hughes, Anna Carey, Aoife Murphy and Sarra Manning) for many hours of amusement. (You are all wrong.)
Huge thanks also to my two book clubs for reminding me how much I love reading and talking about books that I haven’t written, and to Alison Gleeson, Jo Anderson and Sarah Law for making me laugh every Friday morning.
I couldn’t write anything at all without James, or Edward and Patrick who mudlarked with so much enthusiasm and found so many revolting (but not human) bones, or Fred (who actually doesn’t help at all but I adore). Thanks also to my inspiring parents Frank and Alison, to Philippa, Kerry, Mary, Michael and Bridget and the rest of my family.
Finally, my special thanks to Claire Graham, who is a wonderful person and a great friend. This book is dedicated to her; she truly deserves it and so much more.