Books Read: The Girl at the Window by Rowan Coleman

Ponden Hall is a centuries-old house on the Yorkshire moors, a magical place full of stories. It's also where Trudy Heaton grew up. And where she ran away from...

Now, after the devastating loss of her husband, she is returning home with her young son, Will, who refuses to believe his father is dead.

While Trudy tries to do her best for her son, she must also attempt to build bridges with her eccentric mother. And then there is the Hall itself: fallen into disrepair but generations of lives and loves still echo in its shadows, sometimes even reaching out to the present...

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I'd like to thank Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me to be a part of this blog tour and Ebury Books for my copy of The Girl at the Window to review.

When a proof copy of The Girl at the Window dropped through my letterbox unexpectedly earlier this year I wasn't really sure whether it would be my type of read as had seen that it had been categorised as a paranormal/ghost story which is not a genre I particularly enjoy reading.  However, I'm glad to say that I ignored my reservations and signed up to the blog tour as no sooner had I started reading then I was soon lost in the story of Trudy (Tru) and the history of Ponden Hall.

When we first meet Tru she's at a loss as to where her future lies, her husband Abe is missing presumed dead following a plane crash and she's had to give up the home they shared and move back to Yorkshire with her son Will.  Tru has not been back to her childhood home Ponden Hall and has been estranged from her mother after a major argument which saw her leaving home never to return until now.  From the outset it was clear that there was a lot of miscommunication between mother and daughter over the events of the past that led up to their estrangement, both had differing views over certain events but is it possible that maybe things weren't quite as Tru recalled.

But Ponden Hall is not the house she knew and loved, it's crumbling down and virtually unliveable but despite its condition she's determined to do whatever she can to bring it back to its former glory.  It's whilst she's taking a look around the house to see what can be restored that she makes a few surprise discoveries and this for me is when the story really took hold.  I loved the whole historical element of the storyline which revolved around diary entries from Agnes, a young girl from the 17th century, and Emily Bronte who was a regular visitor to the house as a child.

The whole concept of mixing fact and fiction with a ghostly supernatural element to create a story within a story made for a captivating read and it's clear, even without reading the notes at the back, that Rowan Coleman has clearly done a lot of research about Ponden Hall, which was described so vividly, and its history.

The Girl at the Window is further proof in recent weeks, if needed, that it's sometimes good to push yourself out of your comfort zone and read a book that you wouldn't typically choose as you could find a real gem within the pages as was the case here.