1 It was the bright yellow tape that finally convinced me my sister was dead. When the police had called me, I’d cried for her, but afterward a slender thread of suspicion had snaked into my brain and coiled itself around my thoughts. Claudia was deceitful, like every junkie has to be, but she also had a temper and hated to be ignored. I’d kept my distance from her since September; maybe being the butt of the world’s worst practical joke was the price I would pay for four months of silence. That suspicion didn’t deter me from getting on the first flight I could out of Barcelona, but it kept my heart beating at a relatively steady pace until I’d arrived in New York. Part of me believed that I would come home and find my sister waiting for me with her dark eyes and twisted smile, pleased with herself for tricking me back into her orbit. Instead, I’d raced up the stairs of the Lower East Side tenement and found her door crisscrossed with yellow crime-scene tape. My hands shook as I peeled it off the right side of the door frame, leaving tendrils dangling like wilted vines. This was further than Claudia had ever gone for a joke. My old keys still turned the two locks. Then I took a deep breath, pushed the door open, and stepped inside. The smell wasn’t anything like death. Instead, something sweetly floral made my nose twitch. The apartment had always been shortchanged on natural light, but there was enough to make out ghostly silhouettes

"[A] razor sharp mystery debut. . . . Davidson offers a great portrait of sisterly love, despite a dysfunctional past, as well as a highly satisfying mystery."-- Publishers Weekly on The Damage Done "Hilary Davidson makes a stunning debut with The Damage Done . It''s a smart crime novel, peopled with sinister characters and clever twists you won''t see coming. Davidson grabs you by the throat with her opening, and doesn''t let go till the end."--Linda Fairstein, New York Times bestselling author of Hell Gate and Lethal Legacy "Sinking us into the noir New York of Sara Gran and Charlie Huston, Hilary Davidson''s lush novel The Damage Done delivers on all counts, offering both slow-burn suspense and creeping pathos. Taking the classic story of hero''s quest to solve the riddle of a wayward sister, it''s ultimately a tale of lost women, victims and victimizers, damaging and perilously damaged. A rich, haunting debut."--Megan Abbott, Edgar-winning author of Die a Little, Queenpin, and Bury Me Deep “ The Damage Done  is truly an astonishing read. Think Hitchcock writing for the hip Manhattan set and still, with a wondrous compassion that moves on nigh on every page. If Tess Gerritsen and Laura Lippman collaborated, you’d get a novel as fine as this. Terrific insights into the damaged sister’s psyche and all the emotions therein, rendered in a prose that is a joy to read. Neil Young might have to rewrite the song. The novel is that startling and original