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by Liad Shoham
When young social activist Michal Poleg is found dead in her Tel Aviv apartment, her body showing signs of severe violence, officer Anat Nachmias is given the lead on her first murder investigation. Eager to find answers, the talented and sensitive cop looks to the victim's past for clues, focusing on the last days before her death. Could one of the asylum seekers Michal worked with be behind this crime?
Then a young African man confesses to the murder, and Anat's commanders say the case is closed. But the cop isn't convinced. She believes that Michal, a tiny girl with a gift for irritating people, got involved in something far too big and dangerous for her to handle.
Joined by Michal's clumsy yet charming boss, Anat is pulled deep into a perplexing shadow world where war victims and criminals, angels and demons, idealists and cynics, aid organizations and criminal syndicates intersect. But the truth may be more than Anat can handle, bringing her face to face with an evil she's never before experienced.
"Starred Review. The author movingly depicts the plight of African immigrants in Israel without being heavy-handed." - Publishers Weekly
"Shoham is one of the best-selling thriller writers in Israel, and this is his second book, following the excellent Lineup (2013)." - Booklist
"This is a powerful, disturbing view of a little-known aspect of modern Israeli society. The shocking revelation at the end solves the murder but doesn't neatly resolve everything else in this carefully crafted tale of deceit and betrayal." - Library Journal
This information about Asylum City was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Liad Shoham is Israel's leading crime writer and a practicing attorney with degrees from Jerusalem's Hebrew University and the London School of Economics. All his crime novels have been critically acclaimed bestsellers. He lives in Tel Aviv with his wife and two children.
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