Description
'Eerie. Dangerous. I loved it' - Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground
'Evocative, tender, terrifying . . . Superb' - Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies
'Powerful, inventive and gripping to the very end' - Ian McGuire, author of The North Water
Exquisitely written and impossible to put down, The Hill in the Dark Grove is a haunting and sinister story steeped in Welsh folklore. Moving and chilling in equal measure, it is a story about a lost way of life and the terrifying lengths we go to to protect what we know.
Carwyn and Rhian - the last in a long line of sheep farmers - are living out a brutal year on their hillside farm, deep in the mountains of Eryri, North Wales.
When Carwyn discovers a buried prehistoric ruin in one of the fields on their land, his curiosity quickly descends into obsession. His wife, Rhian, meanwhile, is confronted with the growing realization that the man with whom she shares her life and home is becoming a frightening stranger.
As the harsh winter closes in, Rhian finds herself alone with her increasingly peculiar husband, and the mountains, and the looming megalithic stones.
'Vibrates with unease' - Anthony Shapland, author of A Room Above a Shop
For fans of Sophie Mackintosh, Claire Fuller's Unsettled Ground and Andrew Michael Hurley's The Loney, The Hill in the Dark Grove is a gripping story of love and survival played out amidst the looming mountains of North Wales.
About the Author
Liam Higginson was born and raised in rural North Wales and lives in Llandudno with his wife. The Hill in the Dark Grove is his debut novel.
Reviews
Witty, tender, ultimately terrifying. Evocative and deftly done; The Hill in the Dark Grove is a book of echoes, haunted by the sheer vastness of time and landscape, and how they enact upon us and the stories we tell. A celebration of love's persistence, a summoning of ancient lore, a superb debut. -- Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies
Gracefully and lovingly rendered with the heft of folklore, land and history, The Hill in the Dark Grove evokes, in dazzling detail, the tribulations of everyday life and the grandeur of ancestry. Higginson takes us on a soul-stirring quest to unearth the past in order to anchor the present before it flitters away. A truly bewitching experience! -- Gerardo Samano Cordova, author of Monstrilio
'Liam Higginson is a new talent in Welsh storytelling; atmospheric, chilling and incredibly touching, The Hill in the Dark Grove holds the reader in its arms, and shows us how our stories, our objects and memories, are shaped and held by the land' -- Joshua Jones, author of Local Fires
The Hill in the Dark Grove is a sumptuously written, dark meditation on aging, obsolescence, and the brutalizing march of time and progress, as well as a chilling folk horror novel. There's something long buried in the mountains of North Wales and within the sheep herders, Carwyn and Rhian, who are economically pushed beyond their limits; Liam Higginson expertly brings it all to the surface -- Paul Tremblay, New York Times bestselling author of Horror Movie and A Head Full of Ghosts
A slow-burning reeking creep of a novel about eerie ancient places and dangerous interlopers. I loved it. -- Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground
The Hill in the Dark Grove adopts familiar Welsh myths and tales - retold to build the scaffolding for Higginson's unnerving saga, his compelling writing vibrates with unease through the intimacy of Carwyn and Rhian. -- Anthony Shapland, author of A Room Above a Shop
Liam Higginson skilfully creates a troubling and loaded atmosphere in The Hill in the Dark Grove: a sense of a landscape as ancient but nonetheless unsettled. The novel is eerie in a way that is rich and abides in the mind. -- Garrett Carr, author of The Boy from the Sea
An intensely imagined and beautifully crafted novel about myth, memory, landscape and the extraordinary, unworldly power of the deep past. Powerful, inventive and gripping to the very end. -- Ian McGuire, Booker-longlisted author of The North Water
Book Information
ISBN 9781035069422
Author Liam Higginson
Format Hardback
Page Count 304
Imprint Picador
Publisher Pan Macmillan
