And He Shall Appear Kate van der Borgh 9780008636548

In the hallowed halls of Cambridge, a dangerous obsession takes hold...

When a young man arrives in Cambridge as a first-year student, he finds himself an outsider. There's the punting and the politics, the wine and the waistcoats, all seemingly familiar to everyone but him. Then he falls under the spell of Bryn Cavendish.

A notorious party boy and skilled magician, Bryn is magnetic. To be in his circle is to revel in clouds of ecstasy, untouched by the rules. To be exiled from it is to haunt the peripheries of campus life like a ghost.

As the academic year intensifies and Bryn's magic tricks become more sinister, one question lingers. Is Bryn's charisma the source of his influence or does he wield a much darker and more dangerous power?

Kate van der Borgh grew up in Burnley and studied Music at Cambridge. Now an award-winning copywriter, Kate is also a graduate of Faber's six-month Writing A Novel course and has had her short fiction published by The Fiction Desk. Kate lives in Leytonstone with her husband, Leo, and her unruly greyhound, Pongo.

'A darkly intricate, disturbing novel wound tightly with infatuation, devotion and magic' Lucy Rose, author of The Lamb

'An eerie, deeply disturbing tale that is as mesmerizing as it is provocative' Starred Booklist Review

'Unsettling and richly atmospheric, And He Shall Appear is a bacchanalian campus noir that will keep you up at night wondering what is a trick or magic, and what is it we choose not to see. I loved this tense tale of intoxication, infatuation and friendship, where Saltburn meets The Secret History with a wholly original splash of the occult hiding in the shadows of Cambridge' Aube Rey Lescure, author of River East, River West

'The dread creeps up like a spectre over your shoulder in this haunting debut that echoes notes of M. R. James down the shadowy halls of modern academia' Brian McAuley, author of Curse of the Reaper and Candy Cain Kills