Paperback Release Date: May 2, 2023
About The Book:
When a close relative falls ill, Hannah Larson and her young son, Nicky, join him for the summer at Ashton Hall, a historic manor house outside Cambridge, England. A frustrated academic whose ambitions have been subsumed by the challenges of raising her beloved child, Hannah longs to escape her life in New York City, where her marriage has been upended by a recently discovered and devastating betrayal.
Soon after their arrival, ever-curious Nicky finds the skeletal remains of a woman who had been imprisoned in a room in a forgotten part of the manor, and Hannah is pulled into an all-consuming quest for answers, Nicky close by her side. Working from clues in centuries-old ledgers showing what the woman’s household spent on everything from music to medicine; lists of books checked out of the library; and the troubling personal papers of the long-departed family, Hannah begins to recreate the Ashton Hall of the Elizabethan era in all its color and conflict. As the multilayered secrets of her own life begin to unravel, Hannah comes to realize that Ashton Hall’s women before her had lives not so different from her own, and she confronts what mothers throughout history have had to do to secure their independence and protect their children.
About The Author:
Lauren Belfer grew up in Buffalo, New York. Her debut novel, City of Light, was a New York Times bestseller, as well as a New York Times Notable Book, a Library Journal Best Book, and a Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club. City of Light was a bestseller in Great Britain and has been translated into six languages. Her second novel, A Fierce Radiance, was named a Washington Post Best Novel of 2010 and an NPR Best Mystery of 2010. Her third novel, And After the Fire, received a 2016 National Jewish Book Award. Ashton Hall, her fourth novel, was published in June, 2022. Booklist called it “exquisitely illuminated.” Lauren lives in the historic Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. https://laurenbelfer.com/
Social Media:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorLaurenBelfer
Instagram: https://instagram.com/laurenbelfer1
Twitter:@LaurenBelfer
Book Blurbs:
Ashton Hall was recommended by the New York Times Book Review for fans of historical fiction.
“This book has Daphne-Du-Maurier-meets-Kate-Morton vibes and I was THERE FOR ALL OF IT. The setting, the skeleton, the mystery, the lovable characters … What an addictive read!”
—Julie Clark, New York Times bestselling author of The Lies I Tell
““Exquisitely illuminated.”—Booklist
“[Belfer’s novels] blend the fictional with the historical to create vivid new worlds out of time-faded old ones.”—The Buffalo News
“A brilliant, immersive story rich with intrigue and historical detail, and a stunning achievement.”—Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Magnolia Palace
“Lauren Belfer’s Ashton Hall is masterful, riveting, and atmospheric historical fiction. It made me want to don a velvet cloak, brew a cup of tea, and settle in to watch Hannah and her ingenious son unravel the fascinating, dark, centuries-old secrets of the manor home.”—Alka Joshi, New York Times bestselling author of The Henna Artist
“With vibrant prose and fine-tuned psychological acumen, Belfer shepherds us through a centuries-old mystery and into a modern-day introspection on motherhood, marriage, and love. A virtuosic tapestry of cultures and eras, woven with exquisite precision and detail.”—Georgia Hunter, New York Times bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones
“In Ashton Hall, Lauren Belfer has treated us to a novel infused with the brooding, gothic atmosphere of Jane Eyre or Rebecca. And like those classics, at its heart this is a novel about a woman’s journey of self-discovery. How does a wife and mother reclaim her dreams when her world is turned upside down? In her quest to learn the identity of a skeleton entombed in the heart of a British manor house while dealing with her troubled son and straying husband, Hannah Larson tries to piece together the puzzle that has become her own life. This is a novel that must be savored, one page at a time.” —Melanie Benjamin, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Aviator’s Wife and The Children’s Blizzard
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