The Map of Bones

The stunning conclusion to The Joubert Family Chronicles has arrived.

‘Mosse is a master storyteller’ – Madeleine Miller, bestselling author of Circe

Their journey is over. But their story has just begun. A sweeping and epic story of adventure and courage, injustice and triumph, The Map of Bones by Kate Mosse is the sequel to the number one bestselling The Ghost Ship.

Olifantshoek, Southern Africa, 1688. When the violent Cape wind blows from the south-east, they say the voices of the unquiet dead can be heard whispering through the deserted valley. Suzanne Joubert, a Huguenot refugee from war-torn France, is here to walk in her cousin’s footsteps. Louise Reydon-Joubert, the notorious she-captain and pirate commander, landed at the Cape of Good Hope more than sixty years ago, then disappeared from the record as if she had never existed. Suzanne has come to find her – to lay the stories to rest. But all is not as it seems . . .

Franschhoek, Southern Africa, 1862. Nearly one hundred and eighty years after Suzanne’s perilous journey, another intrepid and courageous woman of the Joubert family – Isabelle Lepard – has journeyed to the small frontier town once known as Oliftantshoek in search of her long-lost relations. A journalist and travel writer, intent on putting the women of her family back into the history books, she quickly discovers that the tragedies and crimes of the past are far from over. Isabelle faces a race against time if she is not only going to discover the truth but escape with her life . . .

Painstakingly researched and beautifully told, The Map of Bones is the fourth – and final – novel of The Joubert Family Chronicles, following the bestselling The Burning Chambers, The City of Tears and The Ghost Ship.

Praise for The Joubert Family Chronicles:

‘Historical fiction to devour’ – Anthony Horowitz, bestselling author of The Twist of the Knife, on The Burning Chambers

‘An utterly absorbing epic’ – Lucy Foley, bestselling author of The Paris Apartment, on The City of Tears

‘Meticulously researched and stunningly written’ – Santa Montefiore, bestselling author of Wait for Me, on The Ghost Ship

Author Biography

Kate Mosse CBE FRSL is an award-winning novelist, playwright, essayist and non-fiction writer. The author of ten novels and short-story collections, her books have been translated into thirty-eight languages and published in more than forty countries. Fiction includes the multimillion-selling Languedoc Trilogy, the Joubert Family Chronicles (the number one bestseller The Burning Chambers, The City of Tears and The Ghost Ship), and number one bestselling Gothic fiction. Her highly acclaimed non-fiction includes An Extra Pair of Hands and Warrior Queens & Quiet Revolutionaries: How Women (Also) Built the World. The Founder Director of the Women’s Prize for Fiction, she is the founder of the global #WomanInHistory campaign and has her own monthly YouTube book show, Mosse on a Monday. Her new podcast, The Matilda Effect, will be launched in summer 2024. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, Kate is a Visiting Professor of Contemporary Fiction and Creative Writing at the University of Chichester and President of the Festival of Chichester.