ALICE HAS made a huge mistake. Her mother is deeply ashamed of her and is sending her to an isolated valley to stay at Fiercombe Manor during the summer of 1933.
The plans for her and her unborn child after summer are something Alice can't bring herself to think about. While trying to take her mind off her own misery Alice becomes embroiled in the tragic events of the history of the families who have lived at the manor. However, the housekeeper and friend to her mother is reluctant to talk about the tragic events of the past.
There are lots of secrets at Fiercombe and Alice begins to feel uneasy as she compares her own life with those from the past. A compelling and evocative read. I asked Kate some questions.
DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS? Not as such, though in a strange way I'd quite like to be proved wrong. What I definitely do believe in is a kind of echo of what went before - old houses, to me, always have more atmosphere than new places.
Some people would probably find it creepy, but I like thinking about all the people who have lived in my house since it was built in the 1700s. That sense of continuity is oddly comforting to me.
WHAT CAME FIRST WITH THIS BOOK, THE CHARACTERS, THE PLOT OR THE SETTING? Definitely the setting. It's based on a real place in Gloucestershire called Owlpen Manor and, though the plot is entirely fictional, there is lots of Owlpen in my Fiercombe.
When I went to stay on the estate for a travel piece I was writing in my journalism days, I just fell in love with the place. The first scene I wrote was Alice's arrival there, even though I didn't know at that point who she was or what she was doing there.
WHAT IS THE SECRET TO DESCRIBING A PLACE (LIKE FIERCOMBE MANOR) SO THAT READERS CAN PICTURE IT IN THEIR MINDS WITHOUT GOING INTO SO MUCH DETAIL THAT THEY SKIP TO THE NEXT DIALOGUE? Setting has always been really important to me as a reader - and I was a reader way before I was a writer. For me, it establishes the atmosphere and tone, and ultimately creates the world I want to retreat back into when I pick up the book again. To build that world you have to make something vivid and almost visceral; as clear in your mind's eye as a set in a film. So I think it's important to write cinematically but also not neglect the senses that film can't convey, such as smell. I think if it's evocative and immersive enough, people won't skip to the dialogue; they'll almost experience it as if they were there themselves. Establishing a place doesn't have to mean pages of description, either. A character looking nervously over her shoulder down a dark passage tells you just as much as describing the literal look of the passage itself.