1945. On the death of his father, Sydney, Lord Otterton finds himself heir to a crumbling country mansion, Cranfield. Despite the fact that his sinister mother has appropriated most of the family funds, the new Lord Otterton manages to persuade his wife and three children to move into the decaying house and set about restoring it to its former glory. To aid him in this task, he recruits Annie Jerrold, a faithful family servant, to be the new housekeeper. She is soon joined by a cast of weird and wonderful characters - a drunken butler, a malevolent French governess and a pair of bizarre lodgers with a rather dubious past. Added to this is an elderly Polish historian, a romantic researching the Whig aristocracy who finds himself involved in a much more intriguing plot on the discovery of some hidden family letters.
- ISBN10 0753817225
- ISBN13 9780753817223
- Publish Date 3 July 2003 (first published 11 July 2002)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 29 April 2006
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Orion Publishing Co
- Imprint Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
- Edition New edition
- Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
- Pages 352
- Language English