'Shimmering, lush...will keep you up all night' - Rene Denfeld, author of THE ENCHANTED

'Eerie and addictive' - New York Times


When I think of Byrne Hall - which I do more often than I'd like - it's the dead weight of the heatwave that comes back to me, and the smell of things going rotten.

Freya Lyell is struggling to move on from her sister Stella's suicide five years ago. Visiting the bewitching Byrne Hall, only a few miles from the scene of the tragedy, she discovers a portrait of Stella - a portrait she had no idea existed, in a house Stella never set foot in. Or so she thought.

Driven to find out more about her sister's secrets, Freya is drawn into the world of Byrne Hall and its owners: charismatic artist Cory and his sinister, watchful mother. But as Freya's relationship with Cory crosses the line into obsession, the darkness behind the locked doors of Byrne Hall threatens to spill out.

"Eerie and addictive...A chilling, masterly study in all the ways love can lead to misery. Like Wuthering Heights...terrifying yet wholly believable" - New York Times

"A spellbinding gothic story ...an exquisitely creepy page-turner" - Publishers Weekly

"A slow-simmering, psychological, gothic novel about grief and longing" - Booklist

"A gothic romance for the contemporary age" - Kirkus Reviews