The second novel from the author of the award-winning bestseller The Loney. Every autumn, John Pentecost returns to the Lancashire farm where he grew up to help gather the sheep from the moors. Generally, very little changes in the Briardale Valley, but this year things are different. His grandfather - known to everyone as the Gaffer - has died and John's new wife, Katherine, is accompanying him for the first time.
Every year, the Gaffer would redraw the boundary lines of the village, with pen and paper but also through the remembrance of folk tales, family stories and timeless communal rituals which keep the sheep safe from the Devil. This year, though, the determination of some members of the community to defend those boundary lines has strengthened, and John and Katherine must decide where their loyalties lie, and whether they are prepared to make the sacrifices necessary to join the tribe...Gripping, unsettling and beautifully written, Andrew Michael Hurley's new novel asks how much we owe to tradition, and how far we will go to belong.
| Primary Genre | Modern and Contemporary Fiction |
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All stories in the valley have to begin with the Devil . . .
After the blizzard of 1913, it was weeks before anyone got in or out. By that time, what had happened there, what the Devil had done, was already fable. Devil's Day is a day for children now, of course. A tradition it's easy to mock, from the outside. But it's important to remember why we do what we do. It's important to know what our grandfathers have passed down to us. Because it's hard to understand, if you're not from the valley, how this place is in your blood. That's why I came back, with Kat, and not just because the Gaffer was dead.Though that year we may have let the Devil in after all . . .
Devil's Day features in the following genres: Modern and Contemporary Fiction, eBooks of the Month, Fiction, General Fiction, Recommendations
Devil's Day is available in Paperback, Hardback
Devil's Day was written by Andrew Michael Hurley and published by John Murray Publishers Ltd an imprint of Hodder & Stoughton General Division