The Distant Hours

“The ancient walls sing the distant hours.” The quote is meant to refer to the secrets of the Blythe family. Raymond Blythe, the castle’s owner, has three daughters. Persephone and Serafina are twins in their thirties. Their younger sister, Juniper, is just seventeen. The Distant Hours by Kate Morton, which alternates between 1942 and 1992, is set mostly at a rundown castle in the county of Kent in England. In the 1940s Raymond Blythe is known worldwide for writing a classic children’s book called The True History of the Mud Man.

In 1992 London Edie Burchill is a thirty-year-old book publisher. She is at her parents’ home when her mother Meredith receives a letter fifty years late in arriving. Her mother gasps and cries out when she opens the letter but says there is nothing wrong. Over a period of time and by questioning her Aunt Louise, Edie learns her mother was evacuated from London during the “Blitz”. She stayed at the Blythe's castle, Milderhurst, for eighteen months.

Back in 1992 Edie decides to tour the castle and meet the now elderly trio of sisters. Juniper, the youngest, is not in her right mind and keeps looking for her fiancé of 1942 to show up.

So what was in the letter Meredith got fifty years late? Why is the parlor door of the castle always locked? And most of all, what was the real inspiration of the Mud Man? As secret after secret comes to light will Edie finally learn what happened in 1942?