In the wake of World War I, the world is a decidedly unmagical place for Mouse Dunne. The Faeries have been gone for over one hundred years, the war has shattered her dreams of becoming a Faerie anthropologist, and her brother is suffering from devastating shell shock when Mouse receives news that her uncle, Lord Dewhurst, has left her Thistlemarsh Hall, a dilapidated manor in the English countryside. Mouse is amazed that the house has been left to her, considering her complicated relationship with the building. As a child, she was emotionally abused at Thistlemarsh by Lord Dewhurst, but the manor is also the last place she and her brother were truly happy together. Thistlemarsh is also one of the last estates to have ties to the Faerie King, a subject that has drawn Mouse's interest since childhood. But there is a catch in Lord Dewhurst's offer: if Mouse does not rehabilitate the crumbling house in a single month, Thistlemarsh will go to the horrid Lord Carlyle, an old enemy who Mouse suspects of more than the usual amount of aristocratic corruption.
A single day of work assures Mouse that she cannot possibly repair the manor and grounds in the allotted time. All is seemingly lost, and that is when Thornwood, a mysterious Faerie lord, appears. He offers to use his magic to repair Thistlemarsh, for a price…
Mouse knows enough about Faeries to be weary, but can she trust this one to help her? Will she unearth how deeply entangled Thistlemarsh’s ties are to the Faeries and heal the century-old rift between her world and theirs? Can she reconcile the ghosts of her past with her wishes for the future? Or will she lose Thistlemarsh Hall, and herself, in the process?
THISTLEMARSH will appeal to fans of Heather Fawcett's Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries for its cozy-historical (but somewhat dark) atmosphere and snarky romance, Alix E. Harrow's Starling House for its use of a mysterious house as an illustration of complicated generational trauma, and Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell for its creepy and folkloric take on Faeries.
