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'There’s a doozy of a murder in Kate Weinberg’s hypnotic debut mystery, THE TRUANTS, one that might have met with the approval of the Queen of Crime, Agatha Christie...Weinberg has created complex, unpredictable players, each with a fully drawn history, and all of them, in one way or another, deeply untrustworthy....the plot {which] keeps taking surprising, even startling twists and turns, ending up — in a switch that would please Christie — on a remote, almost deserted island.' The New York Times Book Review

‘Weinberg’s debut is a page-turning tale of love, death and betrayal on a university campus that riffs on Donna Tartt’s The Secret History while exerting a subtle pull of its own’ i, Books of the Year

‘The fevered trysts of college students are the focus of Kate Weinberg’s clever debut, The Truants’ Irish Times, Best debuts of 2019

‘Kate Weinberg’s debut, The Truants, took eight years to write, and it shows in the multi-layered characters and plot.  If you’ve ever wanted to disappear from your own life, this book will speak to you’ Observer Books of the Year

'A hypnotic debut... [An] uncommonly clever whodunnit' The New York Times Book Review

‘Deft, striking … The parallels between her story’s events and incidents in Christie’s books are ingenious ...’ Daily Telegraph

‘Weinberg herself has an aversion to neat endings, or neatness in general – her plot takes many surprising turns, her characters are multifaceted, and their dialogue pings with curious anecdotes that, unusually, add rather than detract from the whole … The Truants marks [Weinberg] out as a natural storyteller, in the vein of Agatha Christie herself … Startling … Intelligent, fresh … Unforgettable’ Irish Times

‘In this mesmerising debut, Kate Weinberg tackles first love, obsession and the boundaries of self-identity … Hefty foreshadowing and an abundance of twists keep the reader tripping forwards’ i paper

‘As much a coming-of-age tale as a murder mystery, Kate Weinberg’s first novel explores “the sweet spot of heightened possibility before things tip over and get ugly … If there is a moral, it’s that self-deception is a dangerous sin. An impressive debut’ The Times

"Deftly plotted, with vivid compelling characters that leap off the page." Jojo Moyes

‘One of the best books I have read in… forever. I fell in love with these characters and am still mourning that I don’t get to live in their world anymore.... This book is nothing but absolutely brilliant from beginning to end’ Scarlett Curtis

‘Weinberg weaves intrigue worthy of Agatha Christie – you'll love getting lost in The Truants' web of mystery, desire, and deceit’ M. L. Rio, author of If We Were Villains

‘The Truants teases, seduces and thrills but ultimately it's about the best kind of love affair – allowing for the freedom to be yourself’ Miranda Hart

‘Lays bare the lengths to which we will go to feel seen … At once thrilling and heartbreaking’ Meghan MacLean Weir, author of The Book of Essie

‘Reminiscent of Muriel Spark and Donna Tartt. A stunning debut!’ Carol Goodman, author of The Lake of Dead Languages and The Night Visitors

‘Kate Weinberg's The Truants is a deeply affecting, artfully written and entirely gripping story. It evokes university life as seen through the eyes of one of modern British literature's most appealing heroines, and her gradual awakening to the complexity, deceitfulness and amorality of the adult world. The novel combines the best elements of a crime thriller, a campus novel, a love story and a psychological study. It is always beautifully and surprisingly written, has a perfect sense of plot and is consistently clever. Weinberg is a major talent’ Alain de Botton

‘The Truants is a university murder mystery that started a bidding war among publishing houses and is being compared to Muriel Spark and Donna Tartt. It’s set to be the book of the summer’ Town & Country

‘This satisfying coming-of-age novel jives to a thriller-like beat. It’s a debut, though you wouldn't necessarily know it from its assured tone … While Donna Tartt’s The Secret History is a clear influence, it’s Agatha Christie whose work is most explicitly referenced, stoking an ominous sense of impending calamity’ Mail on Sunday

‘The book you’ll fall in love with … With a small band of overly intimate students, a mysterious-yet-inspiring tutor, obsession and a whodunit, there’s much to place it in the same bracket as Donna Tartt but there are also nods to a much-mentioned Agatha Christie. There’s also an ending that’ll leave you thinking and thinking about this plot for weeks, if not months, later; one of the standout books of the summer’ Stylist

‘There are more than a few nods to Donna Tartt’s The Secret History here– the band of student misfits with dysfunctional backgrounds, the professor with oddly intimate student-teacher bonds, plus an overall sense, skilfully seeded by Weinberg, that things are about to take a wrong turn … Threaded into the story are references to Agatha Christie’s novels, with their mysteries and murders and love triangles. The Truants borrows some of these murder mystery tropes, leading us to a dark conclusion that feels satisfying to reach’ Evening Standard‍

‘You know those summer books which draw you in immediately and unyieldingly into their world? That bury you into the characters so nose-deep that when you’re finished, they leave you yearning for the intimate world you’ve just left.Well, The Truants, a debut novel by Kate Weinberg, is exactly one of these … It doesn’t feel like a debut novel at all … The plot is absolutely page-turning … The book makes many references to the mysteries of Agatha Christie which, with its sense of Machiavellian menace, it is remarkably similar too as well as Donna Tartt’s The Secret History. We couldn’t put it down’ A Little Bird