The Outsider

'A brilliant blend of sweeping satisfying family drama with a tense undercurrent of psychological thriller that hooks on and doesn't let go until [Hourican] delivers her last devastating page' Sunday Independent

'The Outsider is everything you could want from high-end commercial fiction - it's sharp, compelling, and full of keenly observed truths about human behaviour. Emily Hourican has always been an insightful, astute writer but this may be her best novel yet.' Louise O'Neill

Two very different families ...

One is loud, eccentric, rich and confident.

The other is less sure of their place in life.

On holidays in Portugal, a near-drowning brings the ten-year-old daughters, Jamie and Sarah, together and a friendship is formed.

As the bond between the girls grows deeper, so too do the ties between their families and an unsettling closeness develops between two of the adults.

Then, as Jamie begins to feel suffocated by the intensity of Sarah's friendship, cracks begin to show.

What will it take to shatter the fa ade of friendship? The affair? The obsessive crush? And which family will be left whole?

The Outsider is the compelling and unforgettable story of the complexity of friendship, marriage, hidden passions and teenage desire.

“An exquisite evocation of childhood and adolescence, riven with a dark underbelly in [this book] will resonate with readers ... fresh and full of well-drawn characters, The Outsider is almost impossible to put down - Irish IndependentAn atmospheric sizzler - The Gloss magazineA brilliant blend of sweeping satisfying family drama with a tense undercurrent of psychological thriller that hooks on and doesn't let go until [Hourican] delivers her last devastating page - Sunday IndependentCompelling, almost hypnotic in its storytelling ... with plenty to sink your teeth into, The Outsider by Emily Hourican is a haunting story about friendship, relationships, and the pressure to be something to everyone, and I highly recommend it. - Books of All Kinds”

An exquisite evocation of childhood and adolescence, riven with a dark underbelly in [this book] will resonate with readers ... fresh and full of well-drawn characters, The Outsider is almost impossible to put down - Irish Independent

An atmospheric sizzler - The Gloss magazine

A brilliant blend of sweeping satisfying family drama with a tense undercurrent of psychological thriller that hooks on and doesn't let go until [Hourican] delivers her last devastating page - Sunday Independent

Compelling, almost hypnotic in its storytelling ... with plenty to sink your teeth into, The Outsider by Emily Hourican is a haunting story about friendship, relationships, and the pressure to be something to everyone, and I highly recommend it. - Books of All Kinds

Emily Hourican is the author of nine novels and one book of non-fiction. Her first novel, The Privileged, was published in 2016, became an instant bestseller, and was

short-listed for the Best Popular Fiction Award at the Irish Book Awards that year. She then published three more works of contemporary fiction, the last of which, The Outsider, is being

developed as a six-part TV series with Treasure Films, with Emily as screenwriter, supported by Screen Ireland.

In 2019 she began writing historical fiction, and has since published four acclaimed, best-selling historical novels based on the Guinness and Kennedy families. The fifth, A Kennedy

Affair, will be published in October 2024.

Emily is also an award-winning editor and journalist with the Sunday Independent,

Ireland's biggest-selling newspaper.

'A brilliant blend of sweeping satisfying family drama with a tense undercurrent of psychological thriller that hooks on and doesn't let go until [Hourican] delivers her last devastating page' Sunday Independent ' The Outsider is everything you could want from high-end commercial fiction - it's sharp, compelling, and full of keenly observed truths about human behaviour. Emily Hourican has always been an insightful, astute writer but this may be her best novel yet.' Louise O'Neill Two very different families ...One is loud, eccentric, rich and confident.The other is less sure of their place in life. On holidays in Portugal, a near-drowning brings the ten-year-old daughters, Jamie and Sarah, together and a friendship is formed.As the bond between the girls grows deeper, so too do the ties between their families and an unsettling closeness develops between two of the adults. Then, as Jamie begins to feel suffocated by the intensity of Sarah's friendship, cracks begin to show. What will it take to shatter the fa ade of friendship? The affair? The obsessive crush? And which family will be left whole? The Outsider is the compelling and unforgettable story of the complexity of friendship, marriage, hidden passions and teenage desire.

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