A Gathering Storm

From the bestselling author of A Week in Paris, and the Richard & Judy Bookclub pick A Place of Secrets, comes a gripping and moving story of secrets passed through the generations of one family ...

Photographer Lucy Cardwell has recently lost her troubled father, Tom. While sifting through his papers, she finds he'd been researching an uncle she never knew he'd had. Intrigued, she visits her father's childhood home, the once beautiful Carlyon Manor. She meets an old woman named Beatrice who has an extraordinary story to tell.

Growing up in the 1930s, Beatrice plays with the children of Carlyon Manor - especially pretty, blonde Angelina Wincanton, Lucy's grandmother. Then, one summer at the age of fifteen, she falls in love with a young visitor to the town: Rafe Ashton, whom she rescues from a storm-tossed sea.

But the dark clouds of war are gathering, and Beatrice, Rafe, and the Wincantons will all be swept up in the cataclysm of events that follow. Beatrice's story is a powerful tale of courage and betrayal, spanning from Cornwall to London, and Occupied France, in which friendship and love are tested, and the ramifications reach down the generations.

And, as Lucy listens to the tales of the past, she learns a secret that will change everything she has ever known ...

Praise for Rachel Hore's novels:

'A tour de force. Rachel's Paris is rich, romantic, exotic and mysterious' JUDY FINNIGAN
'An elegiac tale of wartime love and secrets' Telegraph
'A richly emotional story, suspenseful and romantic, but unflinching in its portrayal of the dreadful reality and legacy of war' Book of the Week, Sunday Mirror
'Pitched perfectly for a holiday read' Guardian
'Engrossing, pleasantly surprising and throughly readable' SANTA MONTEFIORE
'A beautifully written and magical novel about life, love and family' CATHY KELLY