On a sunny summer afternoon by the lake, Cora Bender stabs a complete stranger to death. Why? What would cause this quiet, kind young mother to commit such a startling act of violence in front of her family and friends?

Cora quickly confesses and it seems like an open-and-shut case. But the police commissioner, haunted by these unaswered questions, refuses to close the file and begins his own maverick investigation. So begins the slow unraveling of Cora's past, a harrowing descent into the depths of her own psyche and the violent secrets buried within. The Sinner is a dark, spell spellbinding novel, where the truth is to be questioned at every turn.

"As I read the novel], I kept going, 'I know where this is going--there's no way this could be interesting.' And then it would just take a com-pletely different direction." --Jessica Biel

"The Sinner is unnerving and weird and guaranteed to stick with you weeks later." --Sarah Weinman, editor of Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives and Women Crime Writers

"Hauntingly insightful and sensitive." --The Guardian