Thornyhold: A gothic romance featuring sparkling prose, delightful characterisation and classic intrigue from the Queen of the Romantic Mystery

Mary Stewart

Nov 2019 · Hodder & Stoughton · Narrated by Jilly Bond

About this audiobook

Mary Stewart's storytelling is as spell-binding as ever in her twelfth novel, a gothic romance featuring sparkling prose, delightful characterisation and classic intrigue.

The rambling house called Thornyhold is like something out of a fairy tale. Left to Gilly Ramsey by the cousin whose occasional visits brightened her childhood, the cottage, set deep in a wild wood, has come just in time to save her from a bleak future. With its reputation for magic and its resident black cat, Thornyhold offers Gilly more than just a new home. It offers her a chance to start over.

The old house, with it tufts of rosy houseleek and the spreading gilt of the lichens, was beautiful. Even the prisoning hedges were beautiful, protective with their rusty thorns, their bastions of holly and juniper, and at the corners, like towers, their thick columns of yews.

'A comfortable chair and a Mary Stewart: total heaven. I'd rather read her than most other authors.' Harriet Evans

(P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Ratings and reviews

Best narrator I've heard in a long while. Probably my absolute favorite book, helping me through nights of insomnia, taking me into a world of gentle witchcraft, love, and hope. I've read this book more times than I can count, and choosing to listen to it this time around was a joy beyond imagining.

About the author

Mary Stewart was one of the 20th century's bestselling and best-loved novelists. She was born in Sunderland, County Durham in 1916, but lived for most of her life in Scotland, a source of much inspiration for her writing. Her first novel, Madam, Will You Talk? was published in 1955 and marked the beginning of a long and acclaimed writing career. In 1971 she was awarded the International PEN Association's Frederick Niven Prize for The Crystal Cave, and in 1974 the Scottish Arts Council Award for one of her children's books, Ludo and the Star Horse. She was married to the Scottish geologist Frederick Stewart, and died in 2014.