A Spell Of Winter Helen Dunmore by Helen Dunmore 9780241986523, 0241986524 instant download after payment.

Unsettling love and stifled horror create and then destroy the claustrophobic world of this lush, literary gothic set in turn-of-the-century England.  "A hugely involving story which often stops you in your tracks with the beauty of its writing" (The Observer).

Catherine and Rob Allen, siblings two years apart, grow up in a world of shameful secrets. Their mother creates a public outcry, abandoning her family for a bohemian life on the Continent. Their father, whose mental state always has been slightly precarious, is committed to an asylum in the country. The children are sealed off with their grandfather in a crumbling country estate accompanied by their sturdy and well-loved servant, Kate, and the predatory tutor, Miss Gallagher. 

"A marvellous novel about forbidden passions and the terrible consequences of thwarted love. Dunmore is one of the finest English writers."  -  The Daily Mail 

In true gothic fashion, terror, violence and eroticism collect beneath every dark surface.  They are not as alone in the house as they believe

Helen Dunmore was an award-winning novelist, children’s author and poet who will be remembered for the depth and breadth of her fiction. Rich and intricate, yet narrated with a deceptive simplicity that made all of her work accessible and heartfelt, her writing stood out for the fluidity and lyricism of her prose, and her extraordinary ability to capture the presence of the past.