Thorns in the Hollow

PREORDER — Expected release: 02 March 2027. This book is not yet available. Dispatch is subject to supplier availability and publication-date changes.

A twisty Gothic historical fantasy by the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Silent Companions

Tabitha would do anything to remain at her ancestral home of Reynard's Hollow. So, while marrying her cousin Vincent isn't an inspiring proposition, things could be worse. He doesn't hold a candle to Kit, the gamekeeper's son and her childhood friend, but nothing would ever come of that anyway; she's the lady of the manor, after all, and he's a servant. ​Tabitha's world is thrown upside down when her cousin dies in a hunting accident. He was her best - and only - chance to remain at the Hollow… so what will happen to her now? Why do his injuries look like the result of a brutal attack, rather than a bad fall? Is there something out there - some sort of monster, still lurking in the woods? ​Meanwhile, Kit is wrestling with demons of his own. His mother is acting strangely, and the other servants' mutterings about his true parentage are growing louder. The household, already under strain, reaches a breaking point as loyalties are put to the test and long-buried secrets are unearthed. And then Kit makes a discovery: there is something in the woods, although he doesn't think it's a monster. ​But at Reynard's Hollow, things are not always as they appear. Sometimes it pays to look a gift horse in the mouth…

About the author

Laura Purcell is a former bookseller living in Colchester, Essex with her husband and pet guinea pigs. She is the author of six novels, among them Gothic novel The Silent Companions, which was a Radio 2 and Zoe Ball ITV Book Club pick and The Shape of Darkness, winner of the inaugural Fingerprint Award for Historical Crime Book of the Year. Her short story The Chillingham Chair was included in The Haunting Season anthology, which was an instant Sunday Times bestseller. She also wrote Roanoake Falls, a dramatic podcast for Realm, working with John Carpenter and Sandy King Carpenter.