Lifting by Damien Wilkins Photo: supplied
What motivates people to shoplift - even if they can afford the items they whisk into their pockets or bags? And how do people who've loyally worked somewhere for years, even decades, cope when it is shut down? These are two of the pressure points novelist Damien Wilkins puts his store detective protagonist, Amy under in his latest book, Lifting. Cutty's is the oldest department store in the country, but its long reign is over. The weeks leading up to its final sale are chaotic - and so is Amy's home life with a baby she's struggling to bond with, a mother's who's ill and bills to pay. Damien Wilkins tells Lynn Freeman about his own life of juvenile crime.
