Century

Mercy and her sister Charity are trapped in a endless night-time winter world in their great house with an unchanging routine of walks and lessons. But when Mercy finds a snowdrop on her pillow this symbol of Spring enables her to open her eyes and wonder why her widower father should keep her trapped in such a strange and dreamlike existence. Time shifts allow Mercy glimpses of the past and of the paradise she has lost, when little Mercy could run to her watchful, playful mother and see her father full of love and youth. Contrasts abound – Mercy’s ragged dress with the sumptuous clothes of silk and velvet worn by the revellers of a previous century.

The brooding and mysterious atmosphere of the great house where events, both joyful and tragic, unfold and shift from century to century (the Verga family, we discover, can live forever) is reminiscent of Alain-Fournier’s Le Grand Meaulnes in which events are also enjoyed, lost and then rediscovered. This is an accomplished and richly textured debut novel with a very individual authorial voice.