Why a Booktrail?
2000s: A severed limb, hidden inside a modern sculpture in Margate’s Turner Contemporary.
Deadland
What you need to know before your trail
The two boys never fitted in. Seventeen, the worst age, nothing to do but smoke weed; at least they have each other. The day they speed off on a moped with a stolen mobile, they’re ready to celebrate their luck at last. Until their victim comes looking for what’s his – and ready to kill for it.
On the other side of Kent’s wealth divide, DS Alexandra Cupidi faces the strangest murder investigation of her career. A severed limb, hidden inside a modern sculpture in Margate’s Turner Contemporary. No one takes it seriously – not even the artwork’s owners, celebrity dealers who act like they’re above the law.
But as Cupidi’s case becomes ever more sinister, as she wrangles with police politics and personal dilemmas, she can’t help worrying about those runaway boys. Seventeen, the same age as her own headstrong daughter. Alone, on the marshes, they’re pawns in someone else’s game. Two worlds are about to collide.
Locations
ResetTravel Guide
BookTrail travel to Margate’s Turner Gallery and Dungeness
Meet Author William Shaw on location here – #authorsonlocation
This book looks at various locations in and around Kent and the social divides between them. There’s visits to Folkestone and Margate plus many other places recognisable to readers. Dungeness plays a role as you might expect with an evocative William Shaw novel.
Margate and the art world gets a nice mention:
“Stark and white against the grey sky, the gallery made Cupidi think of a cathedral built by missionaries.”
Margate had once been a greand place, an elegant curve of Georgian houses facing a bay with sand the colour of honey. The town had been sliding downhill for decades. The tourists who had come here to scream on the wooden rollercoaster now went abroad.”
But artists and artisans were opening up shops and galleries it would seem…
BookTrail Boarding Pass: Deadland
Destination: Kent, Dungeness, Margate Author/guide: William Shaw Departure Time: 2000s
Back to ResultsWhere Next?
