This review is written with thanks to Pigeonhole for the opportunity to read and review Bone China.

Blurb:

A Daphne du Maurier-esque chiller set on the mysterious Cornish coast from the author of The Silent Companions and The Corset

Consumption has ravaged Louise Pinecroft’s family, leaving her and her father alone and heartbroken.

But Dr Pinecroft has plans for a revolutionary experiment: convinced that sea air will prove to be the cure his wife and children needed, he arranges to house a group of prisoners suffering from the same disease in the cliffs beneath his new Cornish home.

Forty years later, Hester Why arrives at Morvoren House to take up a position as nurse to the now partially paralysed and almost entirely mute Miss Pinecroft. Hester has fled to Cornwall to try and escape her past, but surrounded by superstitious staff enacting bizarre rituals, she soon discovers that her new home may be just as dangerous as her last.

Review:

Although I have Laura Purcell’s other books on my shelf, Bone China is the first one I’ve actually read, and I was not disappointed. Her writing is absolutely beautiful and captures everything including the surroundings at Morvoren House, the emotions of each character and the tension that runs throughout the house. It drew me in immediately and I longed to know more about these fascinating characters.

There are so many layers to Bone China: the story of Hester Why and how she came to be at Morvoren House, the story of Doctor Pinecroft and his experiments and the story of Creeda and her belief in fairies  Despite so much going on, I never felt overwhelmed and I was interested in how each strand of the novel worked out and how they were connected with each other.

I don’t know what I expected from the ending of Bone China but it certainly wasn’t what happened. There was so much tension as the secrets came out and I was frantically turning pages to discover more. The ending will stay with me for a long time.

Bone China is available from Amazon.