The village being no place for the likes of her -- always that wee bit Other -- Polly lives with her gran on a wyldwood farm. There, her abilities to see the questions people carry, to scent out sex and magic, and to hear the music of discovery and fate are harmless, even in the shadow of the county's grand manor house. Whether its master is an angel fallen from heaven as Cook says, or from the Other place to damn them all as the villagers whisper, Polly takes a place in its kitchens as a downstairs maid.
There, with strict instructions to keep her hair in her cap and not sing to the baking, Polly learns all the upstairs maids eventually fall sick, and that Lord Bertrand is ill the same way - poisoned by the house's ghosts and history. As his beauty, genius and madness encounter her wisdom, magic and skill, they trespass over dangerous lines of class and gender, and between worlds, in search of pleasure, love or something Other.
Author Q&A
1)What gave you the idea for the story?
Between Hedge and Manor came from wanting to see Benedict Cumberbatch in Downton Abbey, but with magic. And sex.
2)Name one thing the heroine loves about the hero, and vice versa.
Polly loves Lord Bertrand's questions and the passionate intensity with which he pursues them.
Bertrand loves Polly's wisdom -- the ancient hedge magic answers she has to probems he's not even aware of.
3)Why did you choose the setting and/or time period?
The story is set sometime around 1900, in part because I've written another book se then and felt like I know the era, in part because it's inspired by Downton Abby, and in part because that period was such a paradox - including both nearly Medieval mindsets and very modern ones - which I wanted to push into closer (and erotic) proximity.
There, with strict instructions to keep her hair in her cap and not sing to the baking, Polly learns all the upstairs maids eventually fall sick, and that Lord Bertrand is ill the same way - poisoned by the house's ghosts and history. As his beauty, genius and madness encounter her wisdom, magic and skill, they trespass over dangerous lines of class and gender, and between worlds, in search of pleasure, love or something Other.
Author Q&A
1)What gave you the idea for the story?
Between Hedge and Manor came from wanting to see Benedict Cumberbatch in Downton Abbey, but with magic. And sex.
2)Name one thing the heroine loves about the hero, and vice versa.
Polly loves Lord Bertrand's questions and the passionate intensity with which he pursues them.
Bertrand loves Polly's wisdom -- the ancient hedge magic answers she has to probems he's not even aware of.
3)Why did you choose the setting and/or time period?
The story is set sometime around 1900, in part because I've written another book se then and felt like I know the era, in part because it's inspired by Downton Abby, and in part because that period was such a paradox - including both nearly Medieval mindsets and very modern ones - which I wanted to push into closer (and erotic) proximity.
Used availability for Skyler White's Between Hedge and Manor