Honour Thy Father

Winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and the Betty Trask Award:Lesley Glaister's first novel is a twisty Gothic tale of familial terror and steadily mounting suspense In a decaying house in the marshy lowlands of England, four spinster sisters live in self-imposed isolation. For more than sixty years, Milly, Agatha, and the identical twins Ellen and Esther-"Ellenanesther"-have been trapped together, haunted by the specter of their dead father, whose evil reaches out from beyond the grave. Now nearing eighty, Milly reminisces over their shared history, reliving memories of domestic tranquility, strife, and young love thwarted in its prime. But the sisters are harboring secrets. Why is Milly always counting the knives? Did their mother really drown in the roaring waters under the dyke? And who is baby George, locked away in the cellar?   As Honour Thy Father moves between past and present, the truth gradually emerges. It is a story of terror and rage, of sudden, savage violence that turned their home into a prison-and the damning secret that still holds them in relentless thrall.