Desolate Splendour opens at Morvane, an ancient estate where crumbling gates, haunted towers, and faded grandeur mirror the decline of the proud Plethern family. The house is steeped in legend, none more ominous than the campanile called "The Devil's Candle," a place tied to Jacobite betrayal, demonic rumor, and the sense that Morvane itself has been cursed by memory. Beneath its lyrical Gothic atmosphere lies a story of inheritance, ambition, and the ruinous cost of desire. That history sharpens with the rise of "King" Plethern, whose ruthless energy restores the family's fortunes, only to bring him into bitter conflict with his wife, Rowena Walsingham. Their marriage becomes a struggle for dominance, and Rowena soon masters both husband and house, withholding intimacy and shaping Morvane to her will. When twin sons are born in the tower room, she favors James, seeing in him the image of her own line, while Charles seems to inherit the Plethern temper. As King fades into bitterness and dies, his spiteful will deepens the family fracture. The novel then widens to Charles's Cambridge friendship with the brilliant Marvell, whose death leaves behind his daughter Viola, now under Charles's guardianship. Viola's beauty, pride, and independence unsettle Morvane, while Charles struggles between duty and attraction, and the family's old patterns of power, resentment, and hidden motive begin to repeat themselves. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.
