The Haunting of Alma Fielding

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2020 BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE A page-turner with the authority of history PHILIPPA GREGORY As gripping as a novel. An engaging, unsettling, deeply satisfying read SARAH WATERS London, 1938. Alma Fielding, an ordinary young woman, begins to experience supernatural events in her suburban home. Nandor Fodor a Jewish-Hungarian refugee and chief ghost hunter for the International Institute for Psychical research begins to investigate. In doing so he discovers a different and darker type of haunting: trauma, alienation, loss and the foreshadowing of a nations worst fears. As the spectre of Fascism lengthens over Europe, and as Fodors obsession with the case deepens, Alma becomes ever more disturbed. With rigour, daring and insight, the award-winning pioneer of historical narrative non-fiction Kate Summerscale shadows Fodors enquiry, delving into long-hidden archives to find the human story behind a very modern haunting. An empathetic, meticulous account of a spiritual unravelling; a tribute to the astonishing power of the human mind - but also a properly absorbing, baffling, satisfying detective story AIDA EDEMARIAM A PICK OF THE AUTUMN IN THE TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, OBSERVER AND THE GUARDIAN