Novel set in USA, LONDON, PARIS
The Doll Princess

Location(s): Manchester
Genre(s): Thriller
Era(s): Mid 1990s
Imoved to Manchester in 1998, two years after The Doll Princess is set. While I recognise the areas – and accents – in Tom Benn’s debut novel, the immediate aftermath of the 1996 IRA bomb is something I never saw: nor the grimy Northern gangland he portrays in this swaggering book. Whether Stockport lad Benn (born in 1987) has seen much of the latter, given his tender years, really doesn’t matter. He gives such an adrenalin-soaked expedition to the seedier side of suburbs such as Wythenshawe, Hulme and Rusholme, and to the nightclubs and penthouses of Deansgate and central Manchester, that I was just pleased to be along for the ride. Rebecca Armstrong for the Independent
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