At the very second of Dylan Thomas's death in New York, Raymond Flaherty was born in Montreal. Was it a coincidence that the ghost of Thomas would become a fatal influence in Flaherty's academic career and subsequent murder convictions?And so we have the premise of a cosmic coincidence that begins a darkly witty, unsettling and unforgettable tale of literature, obsession, biography and murder as we follow the exploits of the world's foremost expert on the famous Welsh poet.By turns comic, erudite and chilling, this is a novel that asks 'what happens when art and madness share the same voice?'For readers of literary fiction, metafiction and psychological thrillers, Words is a daring exploration of genius, guilt and the ghosts that haunt us. Weaving together Thomas's chaotic genius, the grime and grit of working-class Montreal and the narrator's macabre philosophy of life and death, Duncan delivers a story that is at once a love letter to words and a confession of horrors.