A Flaw in the Design

An ingenious thriller about a father having to adopt his nephew, despite having reason to believe he is a psychopath

''A literary thriller of the highest order'' Julia May Jonas, author of Vladimir Gil has been estranged from his sister ever since her obnoxious son tried to drown his daughter on a family holiday. That''s Gil''s interpretation; his sister thinks he was only playing around. Or did. When she and her husband perish in a car crash, Gil becomes his nephew''s legal guardian. Matthew is now an urbane 17-year-old, raised in Manhattan''s Upper East Side, a planet away from rural Vermont, where Gil lives with his wife and daughters, teaching at the local university. At first, Matthew seems like he has changed, but when he begins to take Gil''s writing classes, he submits a story detailing the various ways a character resembling Gil''s youngest daughter might die. While Gil believes that he has invited a psychopath to live under his roof, the women in his life are impressed by Matthew''s intelligence and charm. Is Gil losing his mind, or are his family in desperate danger?

Autorentext
Nathan Oates's debut collection of short stories, The Empty House, won the 2012 Spokane Prize. He is an associate professor at Seton Hall University, where he teaches creative writing. He lives in Brooklyn, New York with his family. A Flaw in the Design is his debut novel.

Zusammenfassung
'Great characterisation and plenty of genuine suspense in a psychological thriller par excellence' Guardian 'Absorbing and original ... The writing is pitch perfect. A very smart tale packed with jeopardy' Daily Mail 'Terrifying and amusing ... keeps you guessing till the very end' The Times A nephew. An uncle. A psychopath - but which of them is it? Gil knows his nephew Matthew is dangerous. The signs were there early - on a family holiday Gil's daughter was discovered nearly drowning at the bottom of a swimming pool, while Matthew looked on from the deck. Now seventeen, Matthew is orphaned when his parents die in a car crash. He must leave his life on the Upper East Side of Manhattan behind, to live with Gil, his wife and daughters in rural Vermont. He is insolent, bored, disconnected. At least that's Gil's take. To the women in the family he is charming, intelligent, wry. But when he disdainfully joins Gil's writing classes at the local university, Matthew's fiction shows a vivid and macabre imagination spilling onto the page. Matthew is clearly announcing his intentions to Gil, taunting him before he does something awful to his family. But why is Gil the only one who can see this? As Gil begins to follow Matthew around, his own behaviour becomes increasingly unstable. Is he losing his mind? Could it be that he is really the one his family need to fear?