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The Somnambulist
‘Some secrets are better left buried…’
When seventeen-year old Phoebe Turner visits Wilton’s Music Hall to watch her Aunt Cissy performing on stage, she risks the wrath of her mother Maud who marches with the Hallelujah Army, campaigning for all London theatres to close. While there, Phoebe is drawn to a stranger, the enigmatic Nathaniel Samuels who heralds dramatic changes in the lives of all three women.
When offered the position of companion to Nathaniel’s reclusive wife, Phoebe leaves her life in London’s East End for Dinwood Court in Herefordshire – a house that may well be haunted and which holds the darkest of truths.
In a gloriously gothic debut, Essie Fox weaves a spellbinding tale of guilt and deception, regret and lost love.
‘VIVIDLY COMPELLING, DARK AND DAZZLING.’ Katherine Webb, author of The Legacy
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When seventeen-year old Phoebe Turner visits Wilton’s Music Hall to watch her Aunt Cissy performing on stage, she risks the wrath of her mother Maud who marches with the Hallelujah Army, campaigning for all London theatres to close. While there, Phoebe is drawn to a stranger, the enigmatic Nathaniel Samuels who heralds dramatic changes in the lives of all three women.
When offered the position of companion to Nathaniel’s reclusive wife, Phoebe leaves her life in London’s East End for Dinwood Court in Herefordshire – a house that may well be haunted and which holds the darkest of truths.
In a gloriously gothic debut, Essie Fox weaves a spellbinding tale of guilt and deception, regret and lost love.
‘VIVIDLY COMPELLING, DARK AND DAZZLING.’ Katherine Webb, author of The Legacy
Reviews
Vividly compelling, dark and dazzling
Paints a vivid picture of Victorian times
Finishing THE SOMNAMBULIST feels like coming back (somewhat regretfully) from time-travelling to Victoria's England. Essie Fox's descriptions of places are just wonderful. This writer has the neat knack of recapturing the mystical eccentricity of Victorian time and place without caricaturing it. I was totally drawn in. I look forward to the next book from this writer
Essie Fox transports us to the Victorian squalor of London's East End for a tale of illegitimacy, incest and theatricality with so many twists that you'll want to read it in one sitting
I am currently reading THE SOMNAMBULIST, a novel which I am enjoying so much that I was up at six this morning to relish it in the peace of my still sleeping household. It has taken me to new worlds, is riven with suspense, has made my imagination wander, and my fingers itch to turn the last page
A tale of complicated thespian lives, old secrets and many a twist and turn...an absorbing read, well worth recommending
This is a gutsy page-turning novel with a delightful heroine... larger than life Dickensian characters and generous supply of plot twists and turns. But it is no pastiche. It is an affectionate and knowledgeable homage to the genre and a thumping good read
