Blog Tour: The Devil's Work by Mark Edwards

The Blurb

The Devil’s Work is an exhilarating and chilling grip-lit novel that follows Sophie Greenwood, a young mother who unwittingly accepts a job at the office from hell! Re-entering the workforce after having her first child, Sophie thinks she’s found her dream job in the marketing department of an iconic children’s publisher.

But very quickly Sophie comes to find that someone is out to get her and that the dream job may turn out to be a nightmare. A mouse nailed to her front door… A stranger following her home in the shadows… Unexplainable whispers in the office late at night…

As her life begins to fall apart at work and at home, Sophie must confront dark secrets from the past and race to uncover the truth about her new job… before it kills her. What is her ambitious young assistant really up to? And what exactly happened to Sophie’s predecessor?

Mark's Post

My favourite crime/thriller writers and how they have influenced my work – guest post for The Crime Warp by Mark Edwards

Stephen King

To any writer of dark fiction – be it crime, horror or psychological thrillers – Stephen King is a living literary god. I started reading his books when I was thirteen. Salem’s Lot was the first and I spent the next few years devouring his backlist and buying each new hardback the moment it was published.

What I love most about King is that he puts ordinary people in terrifying situations. He sets his stories in a familiar world, stuffs them full of pop culture references and populates them with characters we’ve all met. The everyman or woman. Like the family in Pet Semetary or the kids terrorised by Pennywise the clown in It. When I came up with the idea for The Magpies I realised this was the kind of story I wanted to tell. Scary stuff happening to normal people. Horror invading recognisable lives. Except there is nothing supernatural in my books. The monsters are always human.

My favourite Stephen King books are Misery – a masterpiece of non-supernatural tension – and On Writing. The latter is a must-read for every aspiring writer, not just for the sensible guidelines that make up the latter half of the book, but for the inspirational tale of King’s struggle to make it. The moment when he sells the paperback rights to Carrie is glorious. It’s that moment that every aspiring novelist craves. Pursuing that feeling kept me going when I was trying and failing to get published.

Ira Levin

Stephen King called Ira Levin “the Swiss watchmaker of suspense novelists – he makes what the rest of us do look like cheap watchmakers in drugstores.” Levin only wrote a handful of books but, my God, most writers would kill for his hit rate.

A Kiss Before Dying. Rosemary’s Baby. The Stepford Wives. The Boys From Brazil. 

Okay, he wrote Sliver (remember the Sharon Stone film?) and a sequel to Rosemary’s Baby (in which the first book turned out to be a dream), but I prefer to gloss over them. 

A Kiss Before Dying was one of the first psychological thrillers with an unreliable narrator. I recommend that every fan of the genre should read it because not only is it a brilliantly-written book but because it’s possible to trace the bestsellers of today back to Levin’s sixty-year-old masterpiece.

The Stepford Wives is a short book that had a big impact on culture, and is possibly his best-known novel. But Levin’s greatest work is Rosemary’s Baby. The way Levin turns the screw and makes his poor heroine suffer is squirm-inducingly brilliant. It also contains one of the greatest lines ever written: “He has his father’s eyes.” The father, of course, being Satan. 

Lots of people compared The Magpies to Rosemary’s Baby, but I had neither seen the film nor read the book when I wrote that novel. But since then, Levin has become a hero of mine. When I wrote my latest book, The Devil’s Work, I decided to make the office building in which most of the action takes place resemble the apartment block in Rosemary. Gargoyles on the façade and corridors that are always chilly. I wanted to emulate the air of menace that fills the hallways of the Bramford.  

There are no devils in my book though. Not actual devils, anyway. Just evil people…The kind who make psychological thrillers such fun to write and read. 

Mark Edwards is the author of psychological thriller The Devil’s Work (Thomas & Mercer, out now).

My Review

Mark Edwards is one of my favourite authors, so I was over the moon when publishers Thomas and Mercer gave me the opportunity to read an advanced copy of his latest novel.

The Devil's Work is another of the great psychological thrillers that we have come to expect from Mark.

Sophie Greenwood is a young mum, who finds herself re-entering the workforce four years after having her first child. Having loved Jackdaw books as a child, she was over the moon when she was
headhunted by them, and readily accepted their job offer, but the dream job soon turns into a nightmare, and Sophie’s cosy world is turned upside down.

The tale is told by a younger University student Sophie, and the present day Sophie. At the centre of both narratives is Jackdaw publishing, and a mystery surrounding her time as a student.

The backstory is revealed by the younger, more naïve Sophie, and as the tension starts to build, we see the the older Sophie begin to fall apart.

This novel is very engaging, the pace is excellent. It certainly falls into the category of can’t put down. Sophie is such a compelling character and I really wanted to know what was going to happen
next. There are a lot of other interesting characters, spiteful, manipulative Chloe being one of my favourites.

With plenty of twists and turns to keep the reader guessing, this is rather chilling novel, and there are some genuinely gasp out loud moments.

 I really liked this novel, it's Mark at his best. A definite 5* read.

If you would like to purchase a copy Click here