Books like Always by Nicola Griffith

From cult phenomenon to award-winning literary sensation, 'Always' returns in an exhilarating new thriller. It doesn't matter how well trained you are, how big, how fast, how strong; there will always be someone out there bigger or faster or stronger. Always. That's what Aud Torvingen teaches the students in her self-defense class. But the question is whether Aud really believes this lesson herself-and if not, what it will take for her to learn it. Aud has trained herself to achieve a fierce, machine-like precision, in hand-to-hand combat as well as life. But in 'Always' she is abruptly confronted with the limits of her own power. Her self-defense classes spin violently out of her grasp, and still reeling from the consequences, she embarks on a seemingly simple investigation of Seattle real estate fraud that pulls her into something far more complicated and dangerous than she had imagined.

First publish date: 2007