Heather O'Neill is an extremely gifted writer and Lullabies for Little Criminals is her breathtaking first novel about one girl's struggle for survival on the mean streets of Montreal
'Like Angela Carter, she is relentlessly inventive' Sunday Times
'Full of pathos, spirit and iridescent innocence' Independent on Sunday
The first novel by the author of The Lonely Hearts Hotel
12-year-old Baby is used to turmoil in her life. Her mother is long dead, her father is a junkie and they shuttle between rotting apartments and decrepit downtown hotels.
As her father's addiction and paranoia grow worse, she begins a journey that will lead her through chaos and hardship; but Baby's remarkable strength of spirit enables her to survive. Smart, funny and determined to lift herself off the city's dirty streets, she knows that the only person she can truly rely upon is herself.
Heather O'Neill is a novelist, poet, short-story writer, screenwriter, and essayist. Lullabies for Little Criminals, her debut novel, was published in 2007 to international critical acclaim and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Her second novel, The Girl who was Saturday Night, was longlisted for the Baileys Women's Fiction Prize, and shortlisted for the Giller Prize, as was her collection of short stories, Daydreams of Angels. Her third novel, The Lonely Hearts Hotel was longlisted for the Baileys prize. Born and raised in Montreal, O'Neill lives there today with her daughter.