The Shadow of Life

At five years old, Eppie Gifford is sent to the remote estate of Kirklands after losing both parents. Her stern yet gentle Uncle Nigel and her warm aunts, Rachel and Barbara, become her new guardians, offering a fragile sense of stability amid her lingering grief. As she adjusts to life in the Scottish countryside, the house itself begins to shape her early memories.

Kirklands is a white, slate‑topped mansion perched on a heath‑covered slope, its windows catching the sun like golden squares. Around it a garden bursts with larkspurs, lupins and a solitary snow‑white rose that crowns a thatched summer‑house, the very place where Eppie plays with her dolls. Inside, the towering library, filled with leather‑bound volumes, becomes a world of quiet adventure, while the nearby rooks nesting in the limes add a wild, fairy‑tale chorus to each dawn and dusk.