Consumption has ravaged the Pinecrofts, leaving just Louise and her father alone and grieving. But Dr Pinecroft has plans for a revolutionary medical trial: convinced that sea air will prove to be the cure for the disease, he arranges to house a group of convicts suffering from consumption in the caves beneath his new Cornish home.
40 years on, Hester Why arrives at Morvoren House to take up a position as nurse to the now partially paralysed and almost entirely mute Miss Pinecroft. Hester has fled to Cornwall to try and escape her past, but surrounded by superstitious staff enacting bizarre rituals, she soon discovers that her new home may be just as dangerous as her last.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I am perhaps more than a little bias because any book set in Cornwall has me already half-sold before I’ve turned the first page, add a dash of gothic, a touch of spookiness, some faerie folklore and a good storm or two and this was always going to be right up my street.

The shift between timelines and perspectives added real strength and depth to the narrative. The atmosphere is utterly perfect (to which I have to give Cornwall half the credit) and Purcell has a real talent for building tension in a totally unnerving, mildly hair-raising fashion. If you’re a dog person, you’ll be familiar with the heart-attack inducing presence of a loveable canine companion in any book and, I have to admit, I was far more concerned with the fate of Pompey the dog than any of his human friends. Sorry, human friends, particularly the female cast of characters who were all really quite wonderful.

Overall, another strong bit of creepy historical fiction from Laura Purcell and an ideal Autumn or Winter read but...despite critic claims to the contrary, it’ll always be Queen Daphne for me.