| The Flood | |
| Author: | Ian Rankin |
| Country: | Scotland |
| Language: | English |
| Publisher: | Polygon |
| Release Date: | 1986 |
| Media Type: | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages: | 188 pp |
| Isbn: | 0-948275-09-X |
The Flood is the first novel by crime writer Ian Rankin.
Mary Miller has always been an outcast. As a child, she fell into the hot burn - a torrent of warm chemical run-off from the local coal mine - and her hair turned white. Initially she was treated with sympathy, but all that changed a few days later, when the young man who pushed her in died in an accident.
Now many years later, Mary is a single mother caught up in a faltering affair. Her son, Sandy, has fallen in love with a strange homeless girl - and both mother and son are forced to come to terms with a dark secret from Mary's past.