Seasons of Mist: An omnibus including A Cold Season, Path of Needles and The Unquiet House

by Alison Littlewood

From Richard and Judy bestselling author Alison Littlewood, a genre-defying master of subtle horror, comes a perfectly horrifying omnibus. Containing A Cold Season, Path of Needles and The Unquiet House, as well an exclusive preview of A Cold Silence.A broken family. A dark secret. The cold season has begun . . .In A Cold Season, newly widowed Cass buys a renovated mill in the remove Lancashire village of Darnshaw, hoping that it will give her and her son, Ben, a fresh start. But it quickly becomes clear that outsiders are not welcome in the village and Ben begins displaying a hostility Cass can't understand. As darker events unfold, Cass starts to question her son's sanity. Then a blizzard blows in and Darnshaw is marooned in a sea of snow. Threatened on all sides, Cass finds herself pitted against forces she can barely comprehend . . .Some fairy tales are born of dreams . . . and some are born of nightmares.In A Path of Needles, a body is found in a shallow grave in the trees near Newmillerdam. The victim is a young girl, and the gruesome way in which the body has been posed has the police at a loss. Until Alice Hyland, an expert in fairytales is brought into the investigation and discovers a connection between the victim and an obscure Italian version of Snow White. It seems a fairytale has taken a twisted, nightmarish turn.Then another body is found in a similarly shocking state. Now Alice must fight, not just to prove her innocence, but to protect herself from what lies in wait in the woods . . .What is lurking in the corners of Mire House? In The Unquiet House, Emma Dean is desperately seeking a fresh start - so when she inherits an old house in the depths of the Yorkshire countryside, she realises that this could be her chance. Mire House is dreary, dark and cold - yet when Emma walks inside, she feels an immediate sense of belonging.It isn't long before Charlie Mitchell, grandson of the original owner, appears, claiming that he wants to get to know her as they are the last of their family. But Emma suspects he's more interested in the house than his long-lost relatives.And when she starts seeing ghostly figures, Emma begins to is Charlie trying to scare her away, or are there darker secrets lurking in the corners of Mire House?

Genres: Horror, Fiction

809 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 4, 2015

About the author

Alison Littlewood was raised in Penistone, South Yorkshire, and went on to attend the University of Northumbria at Newcastle (now Northumbria University). Originally she planned to study graphic design, but “missed the words too much” and switched to a joint English and History degree. She followed a career in marketing before developing her love of writing fiction.

Her first book, A Cold Season (2011), was selected for the Richard and Judy Book Club and described as ‘perfect reading for a dark winter’s night.’

Alison's latest novel is The Crow Garden (2017), is a tale of obsession set amidst Victorian asylums and séance rooms.

You can find her living with her partner Fergus in deepest Yorkshire, England, in a house of creaking doors and crooked walls. She loves exploring the hills and dales with her two hugely enthusiastic Dalmatians and has a penchant for books on folklore and weird history, Earl Grey tea and semicolons.
She is on Twitter as @Ali__L

Reviews

[Mel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't like any of it, shame.

First book: Cold Season, never read such a boring confusing book. I couldn't get connected to the characters. It started as a good story that Cass wanted to start over with her son Ben, after she lost her husband Peter in war. The conversation she has with her son are sad, very plain not enough for my part. The story is just hideous and not believable.

Second book: Path of needles
The story is about fairy tales, not a bad idea. But very dull sorry to give such a review. There has been no building up the excitement or to get an eerie feeling, very monotone. The details where good for the police work and forensic but there has been no excitement at all. I was jumping the chapters to find the end, the story was not believable. No fairy tale for me.

3rd book: The Unquiet House

Started as a good old ghost story. I thought at last a good story. The character Emma was a very weird don't know how old she was how she looked like....no information on her character. To much information on the past, as well there is no building up the excitement in those stories all of them. It's very pity the title of those story's sound good but there all boring, sorry! It's a shame and waist of time.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cold season - very claustrophobic and wicker man-esk start completely lost it but the end but found the main characters good.

Path of needles - story of a serial killer gruesomely murdering women like in fairy tales. Quite compelling read and good overall horror.

The unquiet house - classics and best book of the 3. This one was a haunted house story with a quite scary backstory. Was by far my favourite.

[Lynda Dudley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really good books

I enjoyed all three books lots of ideas spinning in the head while being on the edge of the seats would recommend