Twelve

'Can we please all stand and have a moment of silence for those students who died. And can we now have a moment of silence for those who killed them.'Nick McDonell's electrifying novel tells the story of a fictional drug called Twelve and its devastating effects on the beautiful rich and desperate poor of New York City. A bleak Manhattan midwinter and a group of wealthy teenagers, left to their own devices by disregarding parents, delve into the excesses of drugs, sex and the most chilling acts of violence imaginable. Hunter - falsely accused of murder after a fight on the basketball courts, White Mike - a straight-A student who makes a fortune selling illegal substances, Laura - gorgeous but obsessed with a fabulous new designer drug called 'twelve', and Claude - whose trips into the shadier corners of Chinatown have fuelled a macabre fascination with deadly weapons. From page one, this novel pulsates towards its apocalyptic climax. Cool and cruel and utterly compulsive, TWELVE is the d?but novel of 2002. Twelve Paperback edition by Nick McDonell