Published by Harper Collins Publishers, 2022, 408 pages.

Lichen Hall, the Scottish Borders. A place where unmarried pregnant women are sent to give birth and where their babies are given up for adoption. It is not an institution in the way the Magdalene Laundries were; Mrs. Whitlock, the owner of Lichen Hall, has set up this home so that the young women can go somewhere comfortable and safe.

But is it safe? There is an old legend about the Hall: it is said that the daughter of the family that owned Lichen Hall fell asleep in the ancient forest surrounding it and was visited by a malign creature, Nicnevin the witch. She became pregnant, and when the child was born, it was half human, half mushroom. The woman’s parents killed the child, and Nicnevin was so furious that she cursed the family and claimed the Hall for her own.

In 1959, Mabel finds out she is pregnant although she has no memory of having had sex. She is clearly troubled, dealing with trauma she is barely aware of. She feels ghosts in her body, ghosts that react to what is happening not only to her but around her. She is sent to Lichen Hall to give birth.

Six years later, Pearl is sent to the Hall to have her baby. She is driven there by a family friend, Mr. Peterson, who tells her about the accident that killed the Whitlock’s son. According to the story, the Whitlocks took his body from the morgue, and no one knows what happened to it.

The Whitlocks live at the Hall with their grandson, Wulfric, and some of the women who came to have their babies and did not want to leave. On the surface, Mrs. Whitlock seems welcoming to both Mabel and Pearl. But there is a ruthless, steely side hidden behind that smooth exterior.

What is really going on in the house? Why did Mrs. Whitlock stick a note saying “Help me” in the window and then pretend to have no knowledge of having done so? Who are the woman and child that Pearl sees but no one else will admit exist? And what is that creature in the woods? Then there is an entire wing of the house that seems to have been left to rot, and which is being invaded by the mushrooms from the surrounding woods.

The story follows Mabel and Pearl—two very different women, one an innocent and the other much more worldly—as they try to uncover the secrets concealed in the Hall. This is a gothic tale that is also a love story: Mabel finds her love in Morven, one of the women working there. But given the circumstances, they have to be very discreet and secretive about their love.

C.J. Cooke paints a picture of what the UK was like for women in the late 1950s and 60s: the stigma that came with being pregnant out of wedlock, the limited choices that women had, and the near impossibility of being open about their sexuality—or really anything other than the straitjacket of so-called normality.

She frames this within a tale of encroaching menace and dark secrets. The women at the centre of the story are pitted against not only the social mores of the time but also the danger that comes from something that is not human. It is gripping; I was hooked from the start and unable to put the book down. I am looking forward to reading more from this writer.