Clare Beams
Paperback
It's 1948, and Irene Willard has had five miscarriages. She's desperate to give her beloved husband the child he desperately desires and, now pregnant for the sixth time, checks in to an isolated house-cum-hospital run by a husband-and-wife team of doctors who are pioneering a cure, they say, to 'rectify the maternal environment'.
There, she befriends Margaret and Pearl, women who are also yearning for motherhood, and together, they undertake the doctors' examinations, both physical and psychological.
In the meantime, she discovers a long-forgotten walled garden on the spacious grounds, a place imbued with its own impenetrable powers and pulls. As the doctors' plans begin to crumble, Irene and her fellow patients make a desperate bid to harness the power of the garden for themselves - and must face the incalculable risks associated with such incalculable rewards.
Haunting, uncanny and unforgettable, The Garden exhumes private griefs and mysteries in a stunning gothic that explores the ways that women's bodies are policed and manipulated.
