Winner of the 2016 HWA Goldsboro Debut Crown Award.
‘Exquisitely suspenseful, beautifully written, and highly recommended.’ Lee Child
There are six homesteads on Blackåsen Mountain.
A day’s journey away lies the empty town. It comes to life just once, in winter, when the Church summons her people through the snows. Then, even the oldest enemies will gather.
But now it is summer, and new settlers are come.
It is their two young daughters who find the dead man, not half an hour’s walk from their cottage.
The father is away. And whether stubborn, or stupid, or scared for her girls, the mother will not let it rest.
To the wife who is not concerned when her husband does not come home for three days; to the man who laughs when he hears his brother is dead; to the priest who doesn’t care; she asks and asks her questions,
digging at the secrets of the mountain.
They say a wolf made those wounds. But what wild animal cuts a body so clean?
‘Exquisitely suspenseful, beautifully written, and highly recommended.’ Lee Child
There are six homesteads on Blackåsen Mountain.
A day’s journey away lies the empty town. It comes to life just once, in winter, when the Church summons her people through the snows. Then, even the oldest enemies will gather.
But now it is summer, and new settlers are come.
It is their two young daughters who find the dead man, not half an hour’s walk from their cottage.
The father is away. And whether stubborn, or stupid, or scared for her girls, the mother will not let it rest.
To the wife who is not concerned when her husband does not come home for three days; to the man who laughs when he hears his brother is dead; to the priest who doesn’t care; she asks and asks her questions,
digging at the secrets of the mountain.
They say a wolf made those wounds. But what wild animal cuts a body so clean?
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Reviews
Memorable and interesting characters, this story will stay with me for a long time.
Ekbäck is wonderful at evoking place, and the coming ling of real and spirit worlds works a treat. There is so much to enjoy.
A compelling suspenseful story.
Exquisitely suspenseful, beautifully written, and highly recommended
Cecilia Ekback provides something fresh. . . haunting . . . ugly secrets are soon brought to light at the cost of great danger to Maija and her family. Highly individual fare.
This story of the struggle for survival of a family of Finnish settlers in Swedish Lapland in the early 18th Century is not for the faint hearted. The writer creates a convincing atmosphere of a very strange time in a very strange land... The details of how these people survive in an extraordinary landscape stays with you long after you have finished reading.
This debut by Swedish-born writer creeps up on its reader - steadily immersing them in its distant dangerous world. Eighty pages in, it is a surprise to look up and discover you are not snowbound.
Strong sense of place, robust characters and gothiky atmosphere.
There are shivers aplenty in Cecilia Ekback's cracking atmospheric debut.
It's a dark but colourfully told tale, richly laced with elements of gothic mystery.