Tag archieven: Welsh novel

Brigid Lowe – The Bloody Branch

Brigid Lowe The Bloody Branch review and information of the Celtic fantasy novel by the Welsh writer. Harvill will publish the Brigid Lowe novel, on January 29, 2026. Here you can read information about the content of the book, the author and the publication.

Brigid Lowe The Bloody Branch reviews

Whenever a book review of The Bloody Branch, the Celtic fantasy novel by Brigid Lowe, appears in the media, we will highlight it on this page.

  • “Brigid’s book is a masterpiece of poetic reimagining, woven into an intricate, otherworldly, complex and dramatic novel that held me spellbound.” (Barbara Erskine, author)
  • “I adored everything about The Bloody Branch. I revelled in the absolutely exquisite prose – pure poetry – and its intensely atmospheric world shimmering with folklore and magic. I reread lines multiple times, shocked at their beauty. Shifting between violence and tenderness, protest and surrender, this haunting, sensual debut had me holding my breath, firmly under its spell.”(Emma van Straaten)
  • “A magnificent folkloric retelling rich with passion and relevance for our modern world. Every single page captured me, heart and soul, as I bore witness to female solidarity & strength, mankind’s destruction and violence and the endurance and power of nature… Lowe interweaves folklore, history and magic through lush prose and compelling storytelling. Her powers of description are breathtaking…. Stunning!” (Anya Bergma, author of The Witches of Vardo)

Brigid Lowe The Bloody Branch

The Bloody Branch

  • Author: Brigid Lowe (Wales)
  • Book type: Celtic fantay novel
  • Publisher: Harvill
  • To be released: January 29, 2026
  • Length: 384 pages
  • Prize: £ 16.99 / £ 8.99 / £ 14.99
  • Format: hardback / ebook / audiobook
  • Ordering options >

Blurb of the Brigid Lowe novel

Three powerful heroines – a queen, a sorceress and woman made of flowers – plot revenge against the villain who wronged them. A gorgeously dark debut novel inspired by Celtic Britain’s original fantasy fiction.

Man is cruel but the flowers will take their revenge.

Three great heroines – slave queen Goewin, the reclusive sorceress Arianrhod, and Blodeuwedd, a woman conjured from flowers – unite to avenge themselves on the most dangerous man in ancient legend.

Gwydion is a powerful sorcerer, whose ambition and cruelty wreak havoc across the kingdom. When at last the earth itself is put at stake, Goewin, Arianrhod and Blodeuwedd each unleash their uncanny powers to challenge him.

In this vital and visceral novel, Brigid Lowe casts ancient light on desire, sex and our relationship with nature to bring these Celtic heroines to explosive, sensuous, blossoming new life.

Brigid Lowe grew up in a remote Welsh-speaking community on Ynys Môn, with her younger sister and Irish immigrant parents. She now lives with her children in that part of Scotland known as Yr Hen Ogledd – The Old North – formerly joined with Wales in one Cumbric nation. She studied literature at Bangor, completed a doctorate at Oxford, and went on to teach and research at Sheffield and Cambridge Universities, publishing a book and many essays on the art of fiction. Brigid traces her descent from travellers, circus performers, mill workers and gallowglass warriors. She takes photographs of flowers, forages her food, clambers pinnacles, and swims in ice and caves and bottomless pools.

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Liam Higginson – The Hill in the Dark Grove

Liam Higginson The Hill in the Dark Grove review and information of the content of the first novel by the Welsh writer. Picador will publish the Liam Higginson debutnovel, on January 8, 2026. Here you can read information about the content of the book, the author and the publication.

Liam Higginson The Hill in the Dark Grove reviews

  • “Evocative, tender, terrifying … Superb.” (Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies)
  • “A hypnotic tale of twisted folklore that won’t let go.” (Scott Preston, author of The Borrowed Hills)
  • “Powerful, inventive and gripping to the very end” (Ian McGuire, author of The North Water)
  • “Liam Higginson is a new talent in Welsh storytelling; atmospheric, chilling and incredibly touching, The Hill in the Dark Grove holds the reader in its arms, and shows us how our stories, our objects and memories, are shaped and held by the land.” (Joshua Jones, author of Local Fires)
  • “Gracefully and lovingly rendered with the heft of folklore, land and history, The Hill in the Dark Grove evokes, in dazzling detail, the tribulations of everyday life and the grandeur of ancestry. Higginson takes us on a soul-stirring quest to unearth the past in order to anchor the present before it flitters away. A truly bewitching experience!” (Gerardo Sámano Córdova, author of Monstrilio)

Liam Higginson The Hill in the Dark Grove

The Hill in the Dark Grove

  • Author: Liam Higginson (Wales)
  • Book type: Welsh novel
  • Publisher: Picador
  • To be released: January 8, 2026
  • Length: 304 pages
  • Format: hardback / ebook / audiobook
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb over the Liam Higginson novel

Moving and chilling, The Hill in the Dark Grove is a story about a lost way of life and the terrifying lengths we go to to protect what we know.

Carwyn and Rhian – the last in a long line of sheep farmers – are living out a brutal year on their hillside farm, deep in the mountains of North Wales.

When Carwyn discovers a buried prehistoric ruin in one of the fields on their land, his curiosity quickly descends into obsession. His wife, Rhian, meanwhile, is confronted with the growing realization that the man with whom she shares her life and home is becoming a frightening stranger.

As the harsh winter closes in, Rhian finds herself alone with her increasingly unrecognizable husband, and the mountains, and the looming megalithic stones.

Liam Higginson was born and raised in rural North Wales and lives in Llandudno with his wife. The Hill in the Dark Grove is his debut novel.

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