Review Copies: Untying the Knot and House of Silence – Linda Gillard

As part of the 2011 Mental Illness Advocacy reading challenge I read and reviewed Emotional Geology by Linda Gillard. Not long after doing so the lovely Linda contacted me asking if I was interested in reading some of her other work, which a big yes was my reply to and these are the books I chose to read next:

Untying the Knot – Linda Gillard

‘A wife is meant to stand by her man. Especially an army wife. But Fay didn’t. She walked away – from Magnus, her traumatized war hero husband and from the home he was restoring: Tullibardine Tower, a ruined 16th-century tower house on a Perthshire hillside.

Now their daughter, Emily is getting married. But she’s marrying someone she shouldn’t.

And so is Magnus…’

House of Silence – Linda Gillard

‘My friends describe me as frighteningly sensible, not at all the sort of woman who would fall for an actor. And his home. And his family.

Orphaned by drink, drugs and rock n’ roll, Gwen Rowland is invited to spend Christmas at her boyfriend Alfie’s family home, Creake Hall - a ramshackle Tudor manor in Norfolk. She’s excited about the prospect of a proper holiday with a proper family, but soon after she arrives, Gwen senses something isn’t quite right. Alfie acts strangely to his family and is reluctant to talk about the past. His mother, a celebrated children’s author, keeps to her room, living in a twilight world, unable to distinguish between past and present, fact and fiction. And then there’s the enigma of an old family photograph…

When Gwen discovers fragments of forgotten family letters sewn into an old patchwork quilt, she starts to piece together the jigsaw of the past and realises there’s more to the family history than she’s been told. It seems there things people don’t want her to know.

And one of those people is Alfie…’

I think they both sound wonderful! And could both be possibles for the 2012 Mental Illness Advocacy reading challenge.

Have you read either of these books, if so what did you think? If you have also reviewed either of these books let me know by leaving a link in the comments, would love to read your thoughts.

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