Bitter Orange

Nothing is quite what it seems in this engrossing , moreish novel about a naïve woman and the hedonistic couple who beguile her

Nothing is quite what it seems in this engrossing , moreish novel about a naïve woman and the hedonistic couple who beguile her

Rich and compelling . Fuller is an accomplished writer

Reminds me of JL Carr's A Month in the Country , Daphne Du Maurier's Jamaica Inn , and Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle . Incredibly atmospheric, vivid , and intriguing . I had to keep reminding myself that I wasn't reading a forgotten classic.

A stealthy shocker about thwarted desire. A sinister, slow-burn tale that saves its most heart-wrenching revelation for last

A twisty, thorny, darkly atmospheric page turner about loneliness and belonging

As haunting as tuberose and delicate as a scalpel

Heady, claustrophobic . . . makes for perfect heatwave reading . Echoes Penelope Lively's Booker-winning Moon Tiger , Anita Brookner's Look At Me , and Sarah Waters' The Little Stranger

A rich and hypnotic read

This darkly smouldering, desperately sad, superior psychological thriller contains shades of Zoe Heller's Notes On A Scandal

It is rare for me to put down a novel and then immediately consider rereading it to see what cleverness I might have missed . This time, though, I am tempted.

Claire Fuller was born in Oxfordshire, England, in 1967. She gained a degree in sculpture from Winchester School of Art, but went on to have a long career in marketing and didn't start writing until she was forty. She has written five previous novels including: Unsettled Ground , which in 2021 won the Costa Novel Award and was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction, Our Endless Numbered Days , which won the Desmond Elliott Prize, Swimming Lessons , which was shortlisted for the RSL Encore Award. She has an MA in Creative and Critical Writing from the University of Winchester and lives in Hampshire with her husband.