Grief, solitude, and the inner call to be freed from her past are the threads that beautifully and tightly intertwine in this novel.

Anna has lived alone for decades. She is cocooned by, and marooned in, an isolated cottage called Nant yr Aur in the Welsh mountains. The arrival of Siôn, a young man who seems strangely at home in the house, leads to an unpicking of Anna’s past.

As Anna’s relationship with Siôn develops, her perspective on the solidity of her past shifts. Uncertainty, distortion, illusion and subtle betrayal are gradually exposed. Ultimately, a quietly devastating revelation changes the lives of both Siôn and Anna.

Sian Northey writes with economy and precision, setting out what the life of a middle-aged woman with an emotionally complicated past feels like from the inside. She has been a full-time writer for the last fourteen years. Almost all her work is written and published in Welsh. She is the author of three novels for adults, one poetry collection, three short story collections, several scripts, and numerous children’s and teens’ novels.

Translated from Welsh into English by Susan Walton.