The White Mercedes - by Philip Pullman (Paperback)

About the Book

After a single sexual encounter, Chris Marshall falls madly in love with Jenny, a young woman he does not know. Wandering the streets, never coming face to face, each becomes involved with Barry Miller, a small time crook with Edward Carson, a convicted murderer, on his trail. These four spiral around each other until the savage climax when Jenny is gunned down in a case of mistaken identity.

Book Synopsis

A chance meeting with Jenny at an Oxford party leaves seventeen-year-old Chris with hope for a summer romance--and no premonition of trouble. Busy with his job and soon in love with Jenny, whose cheerful surface belies the dark uncertainty of her past, Chris misses all the signs of danger. Before he knows it, he's caught in the sinister web of a criminal whose desire for revenge crushes all those who stand in his way.

"The story line will hook readers and hold them . . . a pageturner that raises some unsettling questions about trust and betrayal and the nature of good and evil."--School Library Journal

"An engrossing, tragic story with rare depth of feeling. . . . Readers won't be able to turn the pages fast enough."--Kirkus Reviews

"Fans of Robert Cormier should appreciate this tense thriller."--The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

About the Author

PHILIP PULLMAN is one of the most acclaimed writers working today. He is best known for the His Dark Materials trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass), which has been named one of the top 100 novels of all time by Newsweek and one of the all-time greatest novels by Entertainment Weekly. He has also won many distinguished prizes, including the Carnegie Medal for The Golden Compass (and the reader-voted "Carnegie of Carnegies" for the best children's book of the past seventy years); the Whitbread (now Costa) Award for The Amber Spyglass; a Booker Prize long-list nomination (The Amber Spyglass); Parents' Choice Gold Awards (The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass); and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, in honor of his body of work. In 2004, he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

It has recently been announced that The Book of Dust, the much anticipated new book from Mr. Pullman, also set in the world of His Dark Materials, will be published as a major work in three parts, with the first part to arrive in October 2017.

Philip Pullman is the author of many other much-lauded novels. Other volumes related to His Dark Materials: Lyra's Oxford, Once Upon a Time in the North, and The Collectors. For younger readers: I Was a Rat!; Count Karlstein; Two Crafty Criminals; Spring-Heeled Jack, and The Scarecrow and His Servant. For older readers: the Sally Lockhart quartet: The Ruby in the Smoke, The Shadow in the North, The Tiger in the Well, and The Tin Princess; The White Mercedes; and The Broken Bridge.

Philip Pullman lives in Oxford, England. To learn more, please visit philip-pullman.com and hisdarkmaterials.com. Or follow him on Twitter at @PhilipPullman.