The new thriller, set in the hothouse world of a ballet school, from the multi-award-winning writer Megan Abbott, 'the perfect storyteller - compelling, confounding and unconventional' (VAL MCDERMID).

It was the three of them. Always the three of them. Until it wasn't.

Dara and Marie were trained as ballet dancers by their glamorous mother, founder of the Durant School of Dance. After their parents died in a tragic accident nearly a dozen years ago, the sisters took over running the school together with Charlie, Dara's husband and once their mother's prized student. But when a suspicious accident occurs, just at the onset of the school's annual performance of The Nutcracker - a season of competition, anxiety, and exhilaration - an interloper arrives and threatens their delicate balance. The instant New York Times bestseller