The Nature of Things

Kate Morton's gothic tale of a haunted house encompasses over a hundred and fifty years of the house's history and a bewildering plethora of characters who have lived in it or whose lives have been touched by it. It all kicks off in the summer of 1862 when a talented young artist named Edward Radcliffe travels with an entourage of friends in tow to a house called Birchwood Manor, located on the banks of the Upper Thames. The plan is that they will spend a relaxing month in the house, but before that month is over their best-laid plans have gone seriously awry. One woman has been shot dead, another one has disappeared, and a valuable family heirloom has gone missing. These events will haunt the next century and a half. In the present day (2017) we meet Elodie, an archivist of the estate of a Victorian activist and reformer named James Stratton. We learn that Elodie is the daughter of a famous deceased cellist and that she is engaged to someone named Alastair whom we never actual...