Deep within the rotting bowels of The City, in its rank catacombs, crumbling sewers and ancient tunnels, society's dregs and dispossessed - and those who are fleeing punishment or who simply want to disappear - struggle to survive. Above ground, the streets and markets teem as people go about their daily lives, and the palaces of the privileged gleam in the sunlight. All seems well. But in truth, the City teeters on the brink of disaster. It is place of cruelty and fear, where the rule of its seemingly immortal and quite possibly insane ruler has brought his dominion to its knees through waging almost constant war over hundreds of years. mongst the outcasts living beneath are a brother and sister with no memory of their past and an old man who wishes to keep his secret. Disaster will separate them but years later, the memory of a tattooed corpse and something akin to fate will reunite them as players in a monumental conspiracy to liberate their world... ombining inspired world-building, complex characters in whose lives the reader becomes wholly involved, morally ambiguous action and thrilling battle scenes, this vibrant, multi-layered novel is a stunning achievement and

Author Biography

Stella Gemmell has a degree in politics and is a journalist. She was married to the internationally acclaimed and bestselling fantasy novelist David Gemmell and worked with him on his three Troy novels, concluding the final book, Troy- Fall of Kings, following his death in 2006. Stella lives in East Sussex and writes in what was once the dairy of 15th-century farmhouse. The City is her first solo novel.