The Marionette

The Marionette

John Surdus

John Surdus is a consultant psychologist practicing in London, with a specialist interest in paranoia, psychosis and obsessional neurosis. The Marionette is his first novel. You can find him on www.johnsurdus.com

Michael Gereon, a philosophy lecturer on sabbatical after an unexplained breakdown, lives in a decayed house in the East End of London with his estranged wife Peggy. The same house in which his mother was battered to death in a drug-deal gone wrong when he was sixteen. Michael’s brother-in-law, Wilf, a washed-up artist, asks to borrow a mysterious carving created by Mike's dead mother and takes it to Italy in search of inspiration. When six pictures by Filippo Casiraghi appear on the London art market months later, all containing an image of the carving, rumours spread that Wilf is the forger. Michael reluctantly investigates and is forced to confront his demons. Specifically, his schizoid belief that, like a marionette, he has no free will and life is run by hidden forces beyond his control. As shadows close in and assassins seek to erase the truth about the art fraud, Michael must somehow find a way to act before it is too late. But first he has to emerge from the labyrinth of his own mind. A relentless, haunting study of a man on the verge of breakdown in a world of random events and lurking violence, set in the atmospheric streets of Spitalfields. A book for aficionados of art, crime, philosophy and abnormal psychology.

Age group 35 upwards. Readers interested in abnormal psychology and crime, art and philosophy. Novel is set in Spitalfields, London.

Paperback

Colours: Red, Grey/Black and White. Strong sans-serif font. Figure of a man who has something puppet-like or disturbed about him. Optionally with marionette strings. Background landscape (optional): a street in Spitalfields (see image attached below). Mood: melancholic/disturbing.

Anything inconsistent with the above.