Thistlebone
1 primary work • 3 total works
Book 3
After the death of Malcolm Kinniburgh, who had previously kept the Thistlebone legend alive, the local Harrowvale constabulary find clues that lead them to investigate the abandoned film production of a 1970s folk horror film, The Dule Tree. Based on a harrowing account from the seventeen hundreds where thirteen innocent women and one man were hanged during the witch trials, the film itself ran into production problems, the source of which has remained a mystery for fifty years.
Britain, 2019. The secluded rural village of Harrowvale holds a dark past—that years earlier, on a farm bordering the vast tracts of woodland, it hosted a cult that was seeking to escape civilisation and find purity in the old ways, namely worshipping an ancient deity called Thistlebone. Led by the charismatic Jasper Hillman, their pagan beliefs grew ever more radical to the point where they held the young Avril Eason captive with the intention of sacrificing her. But Avril escaped…
It has been over a year since journalist Seema Chaudry accompanied cult survivor Avril Eason back to the village of Harrowvale, the site of her terrifying experiences at the hands of Jasper Hillman’s Thistlebone worshippers, a crazed occult group that believed in an ancient woodland deity. Intended as a cathartic experience, both women were changed forever by what they were confronted with. Now, in the process of researching a book on the Thistlebone legend, Seema believes much of it centres around one man — Malcolm Kinniburgh.