Is it Friday already? I’ve been meaning to post about this wonderful review that Madigan Mine received from Kylie Fox and Amanda Wrangles over at Book Lover’s Club on Facebook. If you don’t have a Facebook account, I don’t think you’ll be able to read it, so I’ll post the review in full at the end of this entry.

Book Lover’s Club are also running a competition to win a personally signed copy of Madigan Mine. You will need to be on Facebook to enter, so if you are please toddle along and have a look at their page. All you need to do is come up with a question you’d like to ask me about my life, my work or about Madigan Mine. The most interesting and original question wins the book. I’ll be choosing the winner and also answering the question, so make sure it’s a good one!

Entries close 18 November 2010.

And now, here’s that review:

Once in a while a book comes along that is so beautifully written, so perfectly crafted that it leaves you with a serious case of envy – word envy that is.

Such is the case with Kirstyn McDermott’s “Madigan Mine”. The characters are so rich and believable, the world you are transported into so whole and multi-dimensional and the very mood of the book so tangible that, as a reader, there is never a moment, from start to glorious finish, that you are taken out of the story, reminded that you are simply a spectator to it. No, from the first page it grips the reader by the throat and doesn’t let them go.

Madigan Mine is difficult to outline briefly – every line, every word is a new discovery and to tell of one thing, hints at the next.

Alex Bishop loves Madigan Sargood, has always loved her, so when, after twelve years apart, a chance meeting with her is like a dream come true. But it soon becomes clear that Madigan, though beautiful, is also something far more dangerous.

When she commits suicide, Alex’s troubles should be over. The danger and impending doom that Madigan bought into his life should be gone. But it’s not. It’s only just the beginning.

Alex can’t get Madigan out of his head. She haunts his every waking moment but is it all in his mind? Is he crazy with grief? Or is it something more sinister?

Alex must delve into Madigan’s past to uncover her reasons for committing suicide and to discover why she won’t, even now, leave him alone. His life – and the lives of those he cares about – depend on it.

Madigan Mine is deliciously dark but never gratuitous in its use of violence. The sinister feeling that underlies every line, even seemingly innocent exchanges, never waivers.

McDermott has created a cast of characters that are real. They have flaws, they have motivations that aren’t always pure and, they make mistakes. Not one is a cliché, not one sounds like the “every” character that we so often read, who can belong in any book, any story. Each is unique and each is complete. This is their story, and we never doubt it.

McDermott doesn’t shy away from making the tough calls. For every twist and turn that Madigan Mine takes us on, there are two options for McDermott – and in every one she opts for the harder, the more heart-breaking, the more surprising.

Madigan Mine was read by both the administrators of Book Lover’s Club, and the hardest thing about it was not slipping up and telling the other what was coming next. We  both seriously loved and recommend this book.

~ Kylie Fox and Amanda Wrangles.