The Murder Rule is a legal thriller by seasoned Irish-Australian author Dervla McTiernan.

Hannah Rockeby was bought up by her a sole parent mother, Laura, after a youthful summer love affair with the son of a wealthy family. The boy drowned in a suspicious accident while the two were seeing one another. Laura had been the families house cleaner. She becomes an alcoholic and the mother-daughter relationship between her and Hannah is highly enmeshed.

Hannah moves from Maine to join a group of idealistic volunteers working on the Innocence Project in Virginia. The Innocence Project is an initiative to free wrongly convicted death row prisoners. Her plan is to prevent the man who she believes ruined her mother’s life from being released from jail. Hannah is prepared to do anything including deceiving and undermining colleagues and her boss to succeed in her quest.

Hannah pulled the door slowly closed. There was no creak from the hinges because she had oiled them the day before. She went downstairs, took a folded note from her backpack, and placed it so that it was held in place by the coffee machine.

The novel unfolds with the dual points of view of Hannah’s current life and her mother’s diary from her youth. The Murder Rule is a quick read, and a skilfully plotted story with plenty of twists. The female leads who are complex and engaging (if not always likeable).

The Murder Rule is McTiernan’s first stand alone novel – she is best known for her acclaimed debut, The Ruin.