'He took out his watch and looked at it. He rested for one minute as timed on his watch. He opened the briefcase and took out a passport and a pair of spectacles. He put the spectacles on and looked at his passport, and realised he was the man in the picture. A gunshot rang out.' Part thriller, part spy novel, Exchange Place is set between Belfast and Paris and tracks the individual movements of two men, John Kilfeather and John Kilpatrick, who are trying to solve a mystery concerning a lost friend, a missing notebook and a gun. But this is no ordinary mystery and the usual rules don't apply. Appearances are deceptive; identities dissolve, become slippery; and it's easy to lose track of who you are in the winding streets and passageways of the city. As the paths of Kilpatrick and Kilfeather slowly and inexorably converge, it is only the subterranean Memory Palace that can open the way to the truth. A brilliant psychological thriller that confirms Carson as one of our most talented Irish writers. If you enjoyed Exchange Place, you might enjoy The Pen Friend, also by Ciaran Carson

Author Biography

Ciaran Carson was born in Belfast in 1948. He is the author of nine collections of poems, including Belfast Confetti, First Language, and Breaking News. His prose works include Last Night's Fun, a book about Irish traditional music; The Star Factory, a memoir of Belfast; Fishing for Amber: A Long Story; and a novel, Shamrock Tea, which was long-listed for the 2001 Booker Prize. His translation of Dante's Inferno won the 2002 Oxford Weidenfeld Translation prize, and his translation of Brian Merriman's Cuirt an Mhean Oiche (The Midnight Court) appeared in 2005. A translation of the Old Irish epic Tain Bo Cuailnge was published by Penguin Classics in 2007. For All We Know (2008) was a Poetry Book Society Choice. His Collected Poems was published in 2008. His most recent volumes of poetry are On the Night Watch (2009) and Until Before After (2010). He is the author or two novels, The Pen Friend (2009) and Exchange Place (2012).