Victoria, Australia, 1886...and 1903. Dark shadows fall across two golden summers, seventeen years apart. When beautiful Matilda Gregory, mistress of Summersby House, dies in mysterious circumstances her will brings to light an extraordinary deception - and a terrible wrong from the past. Summersby has a secret heiress, whose name is also Matilda Gregory, a strange, ethereal girl with an irrevocably broken memory. Grieving Samuel Hackett seems somehow linked to his fiancee's death but a pact made with Barker, Summersby's scheming butler, proves effective in silencing tongues. The two men return the second Matilda to her inheritance - and set off a series of puzzling events. Two loyal servant girls, Aggie and Ida, gradually awaken to the sinister forces playing in Summersby's halls. Determined to aid the vulnerable heiress, the maids uncover strange vials, ghostly dogs, and letters from beyond the grave. These eerie messages hint of secrets from Summersby's past - and incidents destined for the future. Biddy MacBryde, a runaway kitchen maid not yet born in 1886, is separated from these events by a distance of half a generation.
Yet Biddy's own path leads her towards Summersby, where in unwitting parallel with Aggie and Ida, she too uncovers a shocking truth about its heiress - and an even more startling legacy.
Author Biography
Luke Devenish is an Australian writer of historical fiction, numerous plays, and several long running television dramas, such as Neighbours, Home and Away, Something in the Air, and SeaChange. His first two novels, Den of Wolves and Nest of Vipers, about the women behind the men of Ancient Rome, were translated into five languages, earning him a passionate international readership. A film and television academic at the University of Melbourne's Victorian College of the Arts, Luke is as fervent about teaching as he is about writing, and is much enjoyed for his lively, inspiring classes. Luke lives with his partner and pets in a sprawling 1860s garden in historic Castlemaine, Central Victoria. Visit his website: LukeDevenish.com
