
As an Amazon Associate and affiliate partner, Menrva Books earns from qualifying purchases. Learn more
A compulsively readable thriller that skilfully weaves together past and present to uncover the sinister secrets buried in the ancient stone quarries under Bath.Kit Parry is a woman with a past, albeit one she'd rather forget. Now a successful engineer, she's spent all her adult life trying to erase the memory of what happened over the long, hot summer of her fourteenth year. When she takes a job shoring up the ancient quarries under her hometown of Bath, however, the secrets she tried so desperately to bury threaten to work their way to the surface. For beneath its sleepy façade, the old spa town is as riddled with unwanted memories as it is with Roman ruins...But if Kit's past holds untold terrors, her present has its own problems. Her ex-husband is tapping her for money, the miners resent her and someone is making it menacingly obvious that she isn't wanted in Bath. To top it off, her burgeoning romance with Gary, the quarry foreman, is threatening to force open doors to the past that Kit is determined to keep shut. When she stumbles across evidence of what could be the archaeological discovery of the decade - a lost Roman temple dedicated to the mystery cult of Mithras - the enigma in her past becomes entangled with a present-day race to discover the secret at the heart of the stone mines, a quest that turns into a dangerous obsession.As Kit's story plays itself out in the dark labyrinth of tunnels beneath the ancient city, events race to a chilling climax in which past and present collide with disastrous effect. For when the walls Kit built to protect herself come crashing down, she must face the truth she's spent her whole life avoiding - and which threatens to destroy her.
When an engineer returns to her hometown to stabilize ancient quarries, she inadvertently unearths long-buried secrets that threaten to destroy her carefully constructed life. Kit Parry, a professional engineer, attempts to reconcile her traumatic adolescence with her current career, but her return to Bath forces her to confront the ghosts of her past. She faces opposition from resentful miners, a manipulative ex-husband, and an unknown antagonist who wants her gone. As she navigates the physical dangers of the subterranean tunnels and the emotional weight of a new romance, she must determine if the discovery of a Roman temple is a professional triumph or a catalyst for her undoing.
This novel functions as a character-driven thriller that relies on the interplay between environmental setting and psychological repression. The narrative structure suggests a focus on the slow unraveling of a protagonist who is defined by her attempts to escape her own history. Readers likely find the juxtaposition of Roman archaeology and modern industrial tension to be the primary driver of the book's atmosphere. The story emphasizes the inevitability of the past resurfacing, framing the protagonist's struggle as a race against both external threats and her own internal walls.
Page Count:
496
Publication Date:
2007-05-01
Publisher:
HarperCollins Publishers Limited
ISBN-10:
0007263643
ISBN-13:
9780007263646
No comments yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!