The Winter Garden

The past and present collide in this historical mystery by author Nicola Cornick.

In 1605, Anne Catesby’s entire world is upended when her son Robert becomes embroiled in a plot to kill the king, forcing her to make the impossible choice between the safety of her family and betraying her son.

And in the present, a former violinist seeks recovery at her aunt’s cottage in Oxfordshire, the family’s ancestral home and former home to Robert Catesby, a member of the infamous Gunpowder Plot of 1605. But when she is visited by a supernatural presence, she struggles to solve a centuries-old mystery even though she tries to rebuild her life from the orchestral ashes.

The Winter Garden is a lovely story and definitely lives up to the comparisons to Susanna Kearsley and Philippa Gregory, from a reviewer who is a fan of both. The historical and archaeological details are great and really inform the novel. Anne, Lucy, and Catherine suffer their great losses, hundreds of years apart, the narrative knitting together in the end. With the sweeping timeline, Tudor dresses, treasure, treasonous plot, and phantoms, what is not to like about this novel?