Conville & Walsh
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Cold Hands
- Author: John Niven
- Category: Fiction Commercial
- Publisher: William Heinemann
- Pub date: 2 August 2012
- Length: 60,000 words
About Cold Hands
Deeply, intelligently satirical… Niven provides hilarious, perceptive entertainment
- Henry Sutton, DAILY MIRROR
Donnie Miller is an expat Scotsman who lives with his wife, Sammy, and their young son Walt in the wilderness of Saskatchewan, Canada – ‘So flat you can watch your dog run away for a week.’ Their nearest neighbour is Irene, a retired American, who lives half a mile away. In his early 40s, Donnie writes reviews for the local paper, The Regina Advertiser – edited by Sammy – and generally lives the life of a monied househusband.
When the family pet is found dead, apparently eviscerated by wolves, a sense of unease creeps up on Donnie. This anxiety grows steadily as distant memories come back to haunt him. One stormy evening during a blizzard, a police helicopter descends from the pummelling snow, lands on their front lawn, and Donnie is told that his wife has been brutally murdered.
A hellish trip down memory lane begins to unfold as Donnie’s past catches up with him after nearly 30 years. Marooned in their sprawling mansion he and Walt realise that they will have to survive more than the storm…
About the Author
John Niven spent a number of years working as an A&R manager. His first book, MUSIC FROM BIG PINK, a factional novella set in the world around Bob Dylan and the Band in Woodstock in the late 1960s, was critically acclaimed on both sides of the Atlantic on publication in 2007. Film rights to the book were acquired by Stephen Butterworth. John now writes screenplays and is currently working on a new novel.