Discover the new novel from the author of TikTok sensation My Year of Rest and Relaxation. In a
village in a medieval fiefdom a motherless shepherd boy finds himself the unlikely pivot in a
power struggle that puts faith to a savage test. Little Marek the abused and delusional son of
the village shepherd never knew his mother his father told him she died in childbirth. One of
life's few consolations for Marek is his enduring bond with the blind village midwife Ina who
suckled him when he was a baby as she did so many of the village's children. Ina's gifts
extend beyond childcare: she possesses a unique ability to communicate with the natural world.
For some people Ina's home in the woods outside of the village is a place to fear. Among their
number is Father Barnabas the town priest and lackey for the lord and governor Villiam whose
hilltop manor contains a secret embarrassment of riches. The people's desperate need to believe
that there are powers that be who have their best interests at heart is put to a cruel test by
Villiam and the priest especially in this year of record drought and famine. But when fate
brings Marek into violent proximity to the lord's family new and occult forces upset the old
order. By year's end the veil between blindness and sight life and death the natural world
and the spirit world will prove to be very thin indeed.
