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I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book which I received from the author. All views expressed are only my honest opinion.
MY REVIEW:
This book was so much more than I had anticipated! When I first heard about it, I knew there would be a dark ambience to it, but this fulfilled my fairytale loving, gilded age heart. It’s the year 1928 in Boston. Millie Foxboro has had a difficult life. Raised in opulence, but by a mother that despises her. After Millie graduates school she returns home to a disaster and subsequently loses her memory. Fast forward several years and she’s working in a dusty book shop, but content with her life. A man visits the shop and offers her a job as a research assistant to his admirable boss.
With nothing to lose and the need of financial security driving her choice, she accepts and moves into the gothic manor of Willowfield. But inside these walls are ghost stories and Millie starts to see things lurking in the shadows and taunting her as a budding romance builds between herself and the man she’s working for. But he seems to be hiding a lot of secrets and her life may be in danger.
STUNNING character development in this story with a small cast of characters that really light up each and every page.
I think all of us who have had deep hurts in out life never escape the anger it inspires. It simply melds into the people we become, and sometimes takes the shape of something new and unexpected, like courage.
The Cruel Dark by Bea Northwick
Heavy use of Irish folktales that leave you unsettled and wondering why there seems to be so much fascination in the macabre understanding of these demons and spirits. Especially as you wander the haunted halls with Millie as she chases down morbid creatures that haunt her throughout the nights.
The ending surprised me in a HUGE WAY. I had built all kinds of theories in my head as to how this was going to end, but Northwick surprised me in such a pleasant way that I had not thought of at all.
For fans of:
- Dark academia
- Nightmarish folktales
- Haunted mansions
- Second chance love
- Historical fiction
- Ghost stories
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Millicent Foxboro is haunted.
Not by ghosts but by the anguish of her past and the uncertainty of her future. After all, even in the progressive year of 1928, most people would balk at hiring a woman who’d spent two months in a mental ward for traumatic amnesia. So when an uncommon assistantship to a reclusive Professor of mythology falls into her lap with an ungodly salary attached, her desperation for stability overrides her cautious nature.
To Millie’s dismay, the widowed Professor Callum Hughes and his estate, Willowfield, are more than she bargained for. The once magnificent home, known for its sprawling gardens and dazzling parties, is falling to pieces after the death of the professor’s fragile wife. What’s more, the staff has been reduced to the only three people not frightened away by rumors of ghosts, leaving the halls empty and languishing in bitter memories.
The professor himself is a grim, intense man with unclear expectations, unpredictable moods, and hungry eyes that ignite Millie’s own dormant passions. The closer she finds herself drawn to Professor Hughes and his strange world of flowers and folklore, the more the house closes in, threatening to reveal her secrets. But the professor is keeping secrets of his own and the most dangerous of all is hers to discover.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bea Northwick is a woman of many interests and a connoisseur of all things spooky and romantic.
She cut her teeth on Nora Roberts and Tam Lin retellings, with a healthy side of Tim Burton and 80s romantic fantasies like LABYRINTH, LEGEND, and THE PRINCESS BRIDE (Inigo is her favorite).
She is a sucker for anti-heroes, redemption arcs, heroines who know their power (or learn to), and tension.
Bea also has a special interest in Fashion History (From 1880s-1960s) and Languages (Fun Fact: she once took an Ancient Greek final exam while in labor).
She lives with her husband, their young children, two dogs, and a black cat in the hot, humid American South where the palm trees sway.
THE CRUEL DARK is her debut romance novel.
Looking for book recs…
Adventures in Literature 
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