Winterbourne

Elisabeth Wolf

A REMOTE, wind and rain-battered island off the west coast of Scotland, a vast Victorian house with a magnificent library full of priceless first editions… and a young librarian eager to take a job far away from the haunting memories of a car crash that killed her beloved twin brother.

Twenty-four-year-old Anne Adams had hoped that taking up a post at Winterbourne House on Craigsea Rock would finally give her the peace of mind and privacy she yearned for but there is a secret room within the mansion’s walls and it houses forbidden books that should never, ever see the light of day.

Edinburgh-based author Elisabeth Wolf (pictured below) – who also writes crime novels as Alison Belsham – has won an army fans with her irresistible reinvention of the gothic genre, creating contemporary thrillers packed with classic tropes like crumbling mansions, vulnerable heroines, windswept landscapes and brooding anti-heroes, but alluringly spiced with a thread of supernatural mystery. And Winterbourne certainly dishes up the thrills, chills and dark romance as readers follow troubled librarian Anne Adams who travels to the isolated island to catalogue thousands of books only to discover that Winterbourne House is not just the source of strange happenings but has an owner as unpredictable, moody and dangerous as the sea that frames its views.

Anne’s life was literally turned upside down when a car she was driving swerved down an embankment, killing her much-loved twin brother Malcolm and leaving her with serious facial burns and a badly broken leg.

Distraught at the loss of Malcolm, Anne’s parents blame her for the terrible accident. Forced to stay with them until she has recovered enough, and feeling unloved, rejected, grief-stricken and guilty, Anne applies for a job cataloguing the library of Winterbourne, an architectural masterpiece on Craigsea Rock.

The island is owned by the largely absent Lucien Broussard and its only permanent inhabitants are the Coopers, an odd pairing of gruff brother and sister who live in a cottage by the jetty and work as housekeeper and groundsman. Anne will live alone in rambling Winterbourne House but she finds solace in both the awe-inspiring landscape and the library with its dazzling collection of books.

However, her early weeks in her new job are beset by obstacles… there’s no internet, the house plunges into darkness every night when the generator is switched off, a swarm of death’s head hawkmoths suddenly appear in the library, and she has two near-fatal accidents. And then there are the unexplained mysteries on the island such as the figure in the lighthouse, a freshly dug grave, and the unaccountable disappearance of the previous librarian who started the cataloguing but abruptly stopped.

When the dark and handsome Lucien visits, he and Anne dine together, they discuss literature and books, and she falls for his eloquence and charisma. But then she discovers a secret room off the library with an unspeakable collection of books… and the diary of the missing librarian whose experiences at Winterbourne mirror her own in an uncanny way. Shocked and afraid, Anne finds herself alone, frightened, vulnerable… and, worse still, she knows she has no way of calling for help or escaping the island.

Winterbourne proves to be a veritable vipers’ nest of secrets, shocking revelations and terrifying events as unsuspecting Anne fights to disentangle her mental fog of post-accident grief, fear, dreams and misconceptions from the nightmares that are unfolding around her.

Trapped on an island where contact with the outside world is almost impossible, the ever-changing weather rules the waves, and even the wildlife seems to have a menacing mind of its own, Anne’s  fears quickly start to ramp up and the actions of the dangerously charming but unsettling Lucien become increasingly disturbing.

Playing a devilishly clever game of gothic trickery, Wolf delves tantalisingly into the territory of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca and Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey with a cast of memorable characters – not least the creepy Coopers – and a house which seems filled to its creaking rafters with hidden evil.

From its terrifying storehouse of secrets to its spine-tingling, claustrophobic intensity, Winterbourne is a sweep-you-away, enthralling wild ride… and with an unexpected denouement that could well herald a second chapter, journey’s end might not yet be in sight!
(Black & White Publishing, hardback, £16.99)