Synopsis
A spine-chilling winter ghost story set in the months after the Great War. Perfect for lovers of MR James and Susan Hill
The War is over, but for petty criminal Charlie his darkest days are only just beginning.
Charlie Briggs is never off-duty, even when a botched job means he’s forced to lay low in a sleepy Hampshire town for the holiday season. Always searching for his next unwitting victim, or a shiny trinket he can pilfer, he can’t believe his luck when he happens upon a rare book so valuable it will set him up for life. All he needs to do is sit tight until Boxing Day. But there’s a desperate story that bleeds beyond the pages; something far more dangerous than London’s mobsters is lurking in the shadows.
Could the book be cursed? Why is he haunted by the horrors of war? Can he put things right before he’s suffocated by his own greed?
My Review
The Great War is over, Christmas is fast approaching and thief Charlie finds himself in a small town in Hampshire. When Charlie takes a rare book from a local bookshop in the hope he can sell it for a large amount of money he gets more than he bargained for.
I started to read this book on a very dark, rainy evening with the wind tapping on my window. This set the scene for the story and my reading experience. When the book arrived I was very surprised as to how small the book was but when I was holding it and reading it was reminiscent of the book that Charlie had taken from the bookshop. The book is very short coming in at just over 100 pages but it is a short story that will stay with me for a long time. The story was unsettling and haunting.
Charlie is not a likeable character and this is shown from the start. He is a thief and dishonest but he is also in a town that is still grieving for the men they lost during the war and he does not seem to appreciate or acknowledge the sacrifices they have made. Rather, he dismisses the part they played in the war and believes he is smarter than them because he falsely got himself made ineligible for duty on medical grounds. He does make a big mistake when he takes the book. To him it has monetary value but it also has sentimental value and memories attached to it.
This was written like a very traditional ghost story and I absolutely loved that because it gave me chills. Once Charlie has the book he starts to see and experience things that could be hallucinations or are they. He starts to experience what the soldiers went through during the war and these have physical effects on him. He can see, feel and smell what happened during the war. Are they ghosts or is it his paranoia because he has taken a valuable item? When I received the book it also came with some poppy seeds and incense. When I started to read the smell of incense emanated from the book and further added to my reading experience. It did feel like finally Charlie was being taught a lesson and he did receive his comeuppance.
A haunting and memorable story!
Author Bio
Victoria Williamson is an award-winning author who grew up in Scotland surrounded by hills, books, and an historical farm estate which inspired many of her early adventure stories and spooky tales. After studying Physics at the University of Glasgow, she set out on her own real-life adventures, which included teaching maths and science in Cameroon, training teachers in Malawi, teaching English in China and working with children with additional support needs in the UK. Victoria currently works part time writing KS2 books for the education company Twinkl and spends the rest of her time writing novels, and visiting schools, libraries and literary festivals to give author talks and run creative writing workshops.
Victoria’s previous novels include The Fox Girl and the White Gazelle, The Boy with the Butterfly Mind, Hag Storm, and War of the Wind. She has won the Bolton Children’s Fiction Award 2020/2021, The YA-aldi Glasgow Secondary School Libraries Book Award 2023, and has been shortlisted for the Week Junior Book Awards 2023, The Leeds Book Awards 2023, the Red Book Award 2023, the James Reckitt Hull Book Awards 2021, The Trinity School Book Awards 2021, and longlisted for the ABA South Coast Book Awards 2023, the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize 2020, and the Branford Boase Award 2019.
Her latest novel, The Pawnshop of Stolen Dreams, is a middle grade fantasy inspired by classic folklore. Twenty percent of the author royalties for this book are donated to CharChar Literacy, an organisation working to improve children’s literacy levels in Malawi.
You can find out more about Victoria’s books, school visits and free resources for schools on her website: www.strangelymagical.com
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