An enthralling novel of two intertwining stories based on real events in 19th century Ireland and the Canadian Arctic.
Two ships Arctic-bound, HMS Erebus and Terror, leave London in 1845, captained by the aging Sir John Franklin. How long they'll be gone depends on the ice. Meanwhile, second-in-command, Francis Crozier, worries about their inexperienced crew.
In Derry, little Weesy Coppin dies of a fever but, as far as her sister Ann and brother William are concerned, her spirit returns to haunt them. While an anxious world waits for news of the Artic explorers, the Coppin family try to understand what is going in their home. But, then, one night, all is revealed when the truth literally steps out of the shadows.
Industry Reviews
Nicola Pierce returns with another eerie, haunting, sea-going historical fiction and it is stunning ... the reader is taken on an intrepid and ill-fated mission filled with determination and mystery ... gripping, wrapping us in the chilling blanket of never-ending cold and ice to labour on with the adventurers, praying for a heroic, positive outcome. It calls us to suspend our disbelief and embrace the possibility of the other world. You may not want to believe any of this, but its' all there in history. Atmospheric, articulate and intelligent, wonderfully imaginative, impossibly true...this is historical fiction at its' very best