The Distant Hours

I loved it overall, but at times it felt like swimming in mud. A real struggle to get through. But in the end it was worth it. I love the author's descriptions and choice of words. Not my favorite Kate Morton book but a story that lingers with you long after the last page.

I really struggled through this book until halfway through. It finally started to get interesting, and I even got to a point where I couldn't put it down. By the end, I wished I had quit while I was ahead. The book makes a reference to "Jane Eyre," but it was probably more like "Great Expectations" with the creepy old lady who is still pining for her lost youth. But even if you love the Dickens novel, don't get your hopes too high. The ending is absolutely contrived and absurd.

I was really looking forward to this book after reading her other two and loving them. If I didn't know better, I would think that this was written by a totally different author! It was very wordy where it didn't need to be, and by the end I didn't care what happened, I just wanted it to be over. So disappointing!

This novel had all of the elements that make a story intriguing to me: secrets, interesting characters, and a plot with a few surprises along the way. Outstanding read! I can't wait to read more from Kate Morton.

The book was ok, but I had to work to keep interested. It was slower moving than I like, and I kept waiting for it to get to the point. I'm not usually an impatient person, but I kept wanting to push the story forward by flipping ahead and skipping pages.

This was one of the best books I have ever read. I actually got a copy from the library first. I was enjoying it so much that I ordered a Kindle version...first time I spent so much on a book. It was worth it. The writing is beautiful. The story just flows along easily.

Having read Kate Morton's Forgotten Garden and The House at Riverton, I couldn't wait for Distant Hours. However, this story seemed tedious to read and I struggled to finish it, thinking, somehow, it would get better. It was not the "must sit down and finish it - NOW!"

If you're looking to be easily entertained in a fluffy, frothy way and having everything spelled out for you....walk on by The Distant Hours. If you enjoy weaving your way through a maze of human curiosities, reaching conclusions and having your theories proven wrong over and over again only to discover that the author achieved a better ending than yours...........this is the book for you. I've read other books by Kate Morton and thoroughly enjoyed them, but the zigs and zags in The Distant Hours is an excellently crafted web of suspense storytelling.

Kate Morton is a fluent writer and accomplished story-teller, unfortunately given to preposterous turns of plot. If she had more emotional intelligence and psychological insight, she might have created a novel worthy to stand beside one of Shirley Jackson's masterpieces, "We Have Always Lived in the Castle." But she hasn't and she didn't.

For readers who like the idea of sisters imprisoned by a "castle," I recommend Shirley Jackson. She never grows stale.

Still reading it. I put it down and then try to figure out where I am...it moves soooo slow.and tries to be sooo deep. Haven't given up on it yet...I went to something faster moving and easier to follow( even though I'm reading a sci-fi novel with alien language).

I really enjoyed "The Forgotten Garden" so I was looking forward to this book. There was so much potential for great characters but the characters spent too much time on daily tasks that anyone can experience. All through the book the author hints at the terrible things that happened during WWII. She tries to share insight into her characters past but it is boring with no depth. You just get glimpses of some pretty amazing things that the characters experienced. It leaves you wishing you could find out more about them. The ending was an attempt to give you more but I was left feeling disconnected. I love it when the characters of a excellent book seem like real, breathing people with feelings and depth.

I wish I could give this book more stars but it was a great disappoint for me. I give it 2 stars for effort and the potential of great characters that was not fulfilled.

I absolutely loved The Forgotten Garden, so I could not wait to read The Distant Hours. I have to say I was very disappointed in this book and reading it was almost torture to me - especially the first half. There was way too much unnecessary detail and I had the feeling the whole time the writer was just writing what she thought readers of this type of book would want to hear - the main character's best friends were books and not people and things like that. The only thing that kept me going is I really wanted to know what was in the letter Merideth received and I wanted to know what happened to Thomas Cavill. The book did pick up a bit after the second half, but for me the "mysteries" were real letdowns and I was sorry I had spent so much time with this book. I wouldn't normally write a bad review for a book whose author I've liked in the past, but I'm hoping maybe with Kate Morton's next novel she'll get back to the type of book The Forgotten Garden was. That book was long and had lots of detail, but it was so well written I truly felt like I was part of the story. I did not get any feelings like that with this book. I'm looking forward to reading The House at Riverton and hope I like it much better than The Distant Hours.

The character development was strong and the story idea was creative. It took a long time to get to the point and was slow-paced. Not a favorite read of mine and I would say not comparable to how go her first book was.

This book weaves the story of several lives and I felt as if I personally knew each one. I'm not a super fast reader so this book took me a while, but I found myself grabbing it whenever I had a moment or two to spare and then stayed up way to late many nights to read it. I absolutely loved it!

I loved reading this book. It is a romantic mystery/romantic thriller. It jumps back in forth in time in a similar way to The Forgotten Garden which I also enjoyed but I think I liked this book a little better! Great read! Some of the mysteries I figured out but some I didn't which made it a fun read.

I thought this was an outstanding read. I discovered that Kate Morton had written two other books; House At Riverton and Hidden Garden. I read both of these books also, and really enjoyed them.. Would like to know if she has written more.

A good read. The Distant Hours includes terrific character development and Kate Morton has done an excellent job of painting a picture of the time in which the story is set. The story is poignant and melancholy which, I think, was the author's intent, I recommend the book.

I find each of Kate Morton's books both magic and mesmerizing. Her characters are well-drawn, fascinating and complex, as are her plots, and she always manages to stay one step ahead of me. The true test of a book that might be called a mystery is whether the reader is continually surprised and is led to make wrong guesses about outcomes but is not mislead - the plot denouement is believable, but so layered that it's just one of a number of possible outcomes and not one of the most obvious ones. Her history and her period re-creation are so flawless that I always feel like I have taken a trip in time. I took a whole day off to read the book because I couldn't put it down. Don't remember the last time I got that caught up.

If you enjoyed Kate Morton's first two novels you should enjoy The Distant Hours. I found this book, haunting, sad, suspensful and I found myself sitting up late unable to put it down. It is one of those books I found myself thinking about days after I finished it.

I loved The Forgotten Garden. I was glad to order The Distant Hours. Really, Kate Morton is a terrific writer. The Distant Hours is scarier and darker than The Forgotten Garden, although that also had its share of creepiness, but more limited. This is a very good book. And you can't put down a Kate Morton book. I found it a little too unsettling for my tastes, which are probably more corny and humorous than average.

Kate Morton did it again with a wonderful read. Her descriptions of the characters and the places in the book are fantastic. What twists and turns she takes with these people's lives !! The secrets just keep getting revealed and you as the reader are always waiting for the next revelation. She keeps you guessing throughout the book's 500 plus pages, but then kinds of wimps out at the end like she was running out of time or pages for this book. Still, I highly recommend it. It is a fascinating story.

I thought it was very dark. I read the Forgotten Garden by her and thought it was one of the best books I had ever read. The Distant Hours was a book I was glad when it was over. Had considered more than once just adondoning. Too much emotional pain.

AS usual Kate Morton's books are long and detailed. However, her story is good and always leaves the last of the book to bring the conclusion somewhat of a surprise. The books is very long-could be shorter.

I really enjoyed the Shifting Fog and the House at Riverton so I had high hopes for Kate Morton's latest offering. I had expectations of a dark gothic tale but this really seems interminable. I'm still only 30 per cent into it but I can't seem to find any connection with the characters. All this feeding chooks and riding bicycles and looking at pies in the oven. Pahleese! When I studied professional writing I remember my lecturer slashing through all my carefully crafted prose of people doing trivial stuff and gruffly saying 'You gotta get rid of this crap and move the story forwards!' Kate's editor (if there was one) should have done the same thing. I sense there must be some purpose in this story and perhaps there is a big ending but it sure is slow going at the moment. I will persist and hope for the best. I'll revisit this review if things improve.

Poor transitions.....choppy...didn't flow well or transition smoothly. Found it a bit disappointing. Would have liked a stronger and more in-depth characterization to match the descriptive passages on the surroundings.

Kate Morton does her best to write the updated Gothic novel plugging in the typical variables into a well-used and beloved formula that usually yields a great deal of entertainment and quality reading time for those of us who enjoy the genre. In this case, a moldering castle, a trio of spinster sisters and a secret help to create atmosphere while a letter written back in 1941 and finally delivered in 1997 jumpstarts a flailing mother/daughter relationship while uncovering some unsettling facts about the origins of a children's literary classic.

For the most part, "The Distant Hours," Morton's third foray into this type of romance, works as an entertainment, meaning that it succeeds in whiling away the time of its audience in a way that both engages and has them desiring more. However, Morton's labyrinthine style of telling stories within stories while changing point of view and time periods begins to get cumbersome after the reader figures out where the plot is actually going and that the overall effect on the main characters really isn't all that critical.

One of the main characters, Meredith, comes to the castle as a child evacuated during the bombing of London during WW2. Morton introduces us to her personal angst with regard to her view of her own self-worth and the role the castle-dwelling sisters play in helping her determine her future. But for the most part, inasmuch as Meredith only serves as a technical vessel to change the novel's venue to the castle, none of this has any great dramatic relevance that later on will cause the reader to ooh and ahh when the climatic scenes are reached and the mystery is no longer shrouded in secret.

Likewise, Edie, Meredith's daughter, the primary narrator of the tale, and the person whose actions somewhat drive the plot, really gains nothing from the whole experience recanted in over 500 pages. She begins as a storyteller and ends as pretty much the same personality with perhaps a better understanding of her mother as a person with desires of her own. As charming as all this bonding sounds, Morton's effort comes across as forced. She has all the components for a modern story told on fairytale turf--the woods, the castle, two Red Riding Hoods and three undernourished grandmothers. Unfortunately, her wolf is tired and dentures facilitate his bite. Present throughout the story as a legend, he seems to be added to the mix a tad too late at the point where the reader has already decided where and how the story should have ended and doesn't really care about the meandering back story told by way too many voices.

In the same respect, Morton's hunter remains non-existent: the hero of "the Distant Hours" is suggested as an afterthought rather than crafted through the thunder and lightning of human chemistry and moonlit nights. Where is the romance? The suggestion of sensual pleasure breaking through the barrier of the classic Gothic heroine's intellectual sensibilities is sadly never explored and this very necessary flare of hope and light in the midst of all the gloom never illumed. In attempting to recreate a neo-Gothic drama, Morton needs to look to past experts: the first person voices of Victoria Holt's heroines--who acted for me as initial welcomers to the suspense/romance/Gothic world and now presently, the women crafted by Susanna Kearlsey whose modern day narratives brings the heroine into her own, unencumbered by convention and class distinctions. Morton's damsel, who cannot be qualified as even "in distress" remains a voyeur like Bronte's Lockwood in Wuthering Heights. She watches and reports; the reader can only guess at her emotional station as the narration comes to an end. We may feel her pleasure that the book has come to a conclusion and all is well with the world, but as the wolf has no teeth, the maybe lovers, living happily ever after, have no heat.

For Morton, a theme revolving around a piece of literature and the backstory of its creation is already explored in her "The Forgotten Garden: A Novel." That story works better as the characters of TFG are all personally invested in the mystery's solution--lives are dramatically changed, bitterness abandoned and burgeoning love blossoms sweetly like lilies of the valley in Springtime. "The Distant Hours" goes out with not so much name-dropped T.S. Eliot's whimper, but a drama-less fizzle--Morton makes a sloppy attempt to make all things right with her fictional world--she provides the outlines, brings her audience to a premature denouement and then attempts to fully flesh out her sketch afterwards when I, for one, no longer cared.

Bottom line? "The Distant Hours" does provide the Gothic romance reader a glorious amount of time whiled away back in the day where crumbling castles and those of the manor born ruled their roasts and controlled each other and their annexed village. Alas, with no Byronic hero and little in terms of romance, "The Distant Hours" flounders a little, meandering down a path strewn with too many spinsters and would-be governesses that dead ends into the depressing debilitating corner of crushed dreams. All in all, it is recommended because of its ability to create a thoroughly chilling atmosphere and for the fact that it attempts to further along the neo-Gothic genre that since the retirement of Victoria Holt, Dorothy Eden and Mary Stewart has floundered for a new voice. Check out the novels of Susanna Kearlsey if you enjoy a modern heroine in a not-so-modern environment.
Diana Faillace Von Behren
"reneofc"

I can't believe that Kate Morton wrote this book! Having read The Secret Garden I was anticipating the same strength and literary competency in this book. But alas, lots of verbiage, not really a story, it just went on and on and on. Even though I skipped several pages/chapters, I finally quit!!! Very disappointing.

I do not write book reviews. This is my first. Let me start by saying, I read alot of books. Its part of my daily nutrition intake. I finish at least a book a week. Anything from the classics or fantasy to romance.... I ate up Kate Morton's other works like rare gold filled chocolate... but this. This I cannot finish. I thought it was just me... why did I keep falling asleep with book in hand? I came to see what others had to say... why this book is getting 5 star reviews baffles me. You must have great resilience to sit through long drawn out page length descriptions of a simple dress or painting... I understand using big words and lots of colorful adjectives, but lets not go too far. This is just over done none-sense. I could cut out dozens of pages of pointless descriptions and it wouldn't effect the plot one bit. The characters and story is intriguing.... but its over shadowed by too many words. Maybe I will be able to finish this book... if not, at least I'm getting a full nights sleep.

I can barely trudge through this book (kindle version); it's been 8 weeks and I'm just at 40%; I'm determined to finish, however, because it was recommended by two co-workers' whose opinions I respect -- we shall see!!

I got this book because I'd read two other books of hers and really liked them, but this book for MY taste was very melancholy, depressing, slow and I actually felt somewhat claustrophobic in some parts which I imagine the author wanted us to feel but I did not enjoy the feeling. The story eventually gives up it's secrets but it was a bit like pulling teeth it took so long and by the time I got to the end I had already guessed all the secrets anyway, (but of course you have to keep reading in case you're wrong). All in all I was not too keen on this story although there were some good descriptive narrative.

I loved the other books by Ms Morton. This one was like walking in mud. I kept plodding through to get to the part where it became interesting and it never did. The characters had no real personalities and the storyline was dull. This book was too predictable. Not at all like her other novels.

This book started out with the promise to be as equally enchanting as The Forgotten Garden. The premise sounded very intriguing - a lost letter delivered 50 years later - what secrets would be revealed in the pages to come? One page dragged on after another and I couldn't get wrapped up in the story. There was just way too much of nothing page after page. I was so tired of it by the last chapter, that I didn't even finish. If the contents of the 50 year old letter were ever revealed, I had lost interest a long time ago!

As other reviewers have said, I too enjoyed Kate Morton's previous books. This book, however, held nothing of the lovely story-telling of her previous books. The entire theme and smaller stories told within this book are much darker than her previous works. This alone does not make for a bad story, but the chapters dragged dully on and on with almost entirely predictable plot outcomes and outright depressing and uninteresting characters. We know Kate has it in her to entertain us with wonderful story-telling; I hope she is able to return to the depth, beauty and intrigue established through her first two books in the future.

I LOVED the Forgotten Garden so decided to try this book. It was so boring that I could not even finnish it. I did not find the characters interesting or sympathetic and the plot limped along at a snail's pace with very little actually taking place.

I forced myself to finish this, convinced all the while that if someone had gone through the book and arbitrarily deleted every third word, the story would still be too long, too cluttered with extraneous characters, and too needlessly convoluted. Do we really need a painstaking description of every rosebud on every teacup, while the main characters are lifeless stereotypes? Were all the judicious editors in the UK on holiday when this was published? Definitely a loser!

Why is it that books that you love the most are the hardest to describe? I sat in front of my laptop for more than a hour , after I had finished reading the book and yet was unable to formulate a word other than "WOW!".

Kate Morton is one of my top 5 favorite authors. I loved her other 2 books and I devoured the 600 plus pages of this book in less than one day.I was incapable of sleeping - the story and the characters pulled me in so deep that sleep was really the last thought I had.

I had been awaiting this book more than any other book this year. The wait has been more than worth it.

There is such a haunting quality to this book which makes it one that you cannot forget easily.There were sentences and whole paragraphs that still resonate in my ears.Kate Morton's beautiful writing is one of the major reasons why I am such a big fan of hers.Her lyrical prose will stay with you. I can actually quote lines from this book (something I thought I was not capable of)- such was the writing.

The setting , a gothic castle, is a character in itself. Such is the author's writing that the castle seems as alive as its occupants.In its veins, runs the secrets from long ago.Kate Morton's breathtaking description of the castle will make you feel as if you are there.Her descriptions are so evocative, so beautiful that it leaves you wanting for more.

Entwined with the suspense element is a heart-wrenching story of three sisters that won't fail to move you.The sisters and their story will break your heart. I felt their pain, their fears . Imagine being a prisoner in your own home with no dreams or hope for a future. I could feel the castle walls binding them, suffocating them.

Throughout the book, I tried to prepare myself for the final shocking conclusion -as the secrets are revealed.Yet I was completely taken aback by the ending which was a disquieting one.

The story's movement between the past and the present is smooth and beautifully done.As each chapter unfolds, we get to know more about the past. Slowly, we are able to piece together the parts to form a complete picture. As secret after secret unravels, years of secrets,betrayal, heartbreaks, tragedies, will shock you. This dark and haunting story will unnerve you and yet won't fail to touch you.

There are certain chilling moments, I shuddered at some points. Its not something very in your face..its something lying just beneath the surface..something not visible.. that creeps you out.

Even after an astounding ending ,I still felt as if there were still things left to the reader to decipher and interpret - the castle had still not revealed all its secrets.

The castle, the sisters, their tragic story - they will linger with you , long after you have read the last page.

The Distant Hours is a perfect read for a rainy night. It has all the makings of a prefect gothic novel- family secrets, an old castle, mysterious deaths, a letter from long ago and madness running through a family .

Even though this is a huge book , I wanted more pages to miraculously appear. Its one of those books which made me want to read on and on.

I think I am a Kate Morton fanatic for life now. This masterpiece of a book has made me very sure that no matter how much I have to wait for her next book, it will be definitely worth it.Its beacause of books like these that I love reading.

Favorite Quote: There were so many , but if I have to choose one, it would be-
"The ancient walls sing the distant hours.."
Somehow this one sentence affected me a lot. It made me think of the past memories. It was so suited for this story. Every old house has its memories-painful and happy.Maybe when you are quiet, you can hear the voices of the people from the past-people who have lived and loved and died. This quote also made me think of something menacing lurking beneath the memories - I guess this was what the author wanted.When the author described the castle, I almost felt all the grief, the happiness, hidden in the castle walls and yet found it so hard to completely penetrate the secrets of the hours gone by.

Overall: Haunting, engrossing and shocking! I wish there was a stronger word to describe how much I love this book. After almost a year, this is a new addition to my list of favorite books.

Recommended? YES ! A thousand times yes! No matter what genre you read, do give Kate Morton's books a try. Though there are many talented young authors today, Kate Morton is still my favorite.

Similar Books:
The House at Riverton-Kate Morton
The Forgotten Garden-Kate Morton
Arcadia Falls - Carol Goodman

My favorite Kate Morton book; it’s utterly enchanting.

Morton’s introductions typically feel like that first opening of the gate into a secret garden, or opening the door on Anne Frank’s house, or the sighting of a famous, almost mythical, painting. The otherworldliness, the mystery that awaits within, is something expected and found in Morton's fiction. As the summary states, and as is typical with a Morton story, we are shown in rotation the past and the present, offered different points-of-view, get a glimpse into others' letters and we are shown snippets of other books within this one. All of this is a simple gathering of clues—necessary for the unraveling of any good mystery.

"I dreamed of Milderhurst that night."

A dreamlike quote, reminiscent of Manderlay, lays ground for such moodiness and puzzling and enthralling enigmas that ache to be solved and answered.

It would be hard to select a favorite narrator of them all, or a preferred time period for that matter, because they are all—Edie, Meredith, Saffy, Percy, Juniper, Raymond, and Tom in their various eras and incarnations—essential to the story. And, with a touch of surprising whimsy, there’s an interesting injection of second-person narration within Edie's voice, where the narrator is speaking directly to the reader.

I was struck by many things as I read this novel. One, that it reminded me very much, of the quote I used when reviewing The Secret Keeper:

"Children don’t require of their parents a past and they find something faintly unbelievable, almost embarrassing, in parental claims to a prior existence."

We head into familiar territory with the characters from The Distant Hours ; a theme Morton handles well. Because, then the focus is on the characters—not the actual secret—and how they’ll handle the truths when they out.

And there’s so much truth in that quote. I, myself, have a diverse, varied, and somewhat juicy family history of life that came before me. But, while I was hungry for information and family tales, I never seemed to have appetite enough to broach the subject. Or, sometimes it was simply easier to put it aside for later. Later doesn’t often come when you expect. It creeps up on you, and sometimes never shows at all. Plus, you’re so full of yourself and who you are and what you’ll become that there’s hardly any room to spare for others’ stories and beginnings.

Two, I became very aware of the historical quality of the “present day” taking place in 1992 in this novel. Edie is the guide within this story; she is why we visit 1939, 1940, and 1941. Edie is the reason we explore the lives of and care about Percy, Saffy, young Merry, Juniper, Raymond, and even poor Tom. And yet, hers is from a time gone as well. No internet, no cell phones, no navigational devices, and no easy connections to be made. This is clearly deliberate on Morton’s part. The magic would’ve been lost if Edie could’ve simply researched everything herself online. Perhaps, someone would’ve already done so. Or, we can go back farther and say Edie would never have been led to Milderhurst Castle in the first place by means of getting lost in the country. Her GPS would’ve guided her through and back to town. So that, even if she had decided to explore more about the evacuation-time home of her mother, Milderhurst Castle, she would’ve just thumbed around online…and there’s very little magic left with that notion.

Edie’s exploration of a part of her mother’s past of which she was previously and completely unaware has a strong tone of sadness playing around it. It’s melancholy in the most relatable way as she discovers the real Meredith hiding beneath the guise of Mum.

But the real driving force behind this mystery are the Sisters Blythe and their castle. They are not to be discounted or cast to the perimeter; singular and yet only as a part of one unit, they are the guardians connecting all the episodes into one.

Another brilliant tale from the imaginative master storyteller, Kate Morton. The Distant Hours had a taste and texture all its own. The Sisters Blythe were a mystery that got more interesting and curious as the tale grew, and you find the same rhythm of unpredictable joy and discovery evident in her other books as Morton peels back the layers. I know that some readers feel she goes into long stretches of description to build up her scenes, but I find it relevant and not extra. There may be a few instances where all the dots haven't yet connected for me - example (spoiler alert!): What was the blood on Juniper's shirt then if not from you-know-who, and did we ever find out? - but then again, I'm certain it is more likely that I missed that as a reader in my haste to finish the book. And finish it I did. I listened yet again to the beautiful narration by Caroline Lee - she is mesmerizing, I couldn't even listen at 1.25x the speed, it was too fast for full enjoyment - and I found the overall theme of this book filled with sadness, regret, and impossible choices that led to much-unrequited​ love on all fronts. And perhaps that is the appeal. Why, after all, would we read happy stories, when all happy stories are similar. It is the unhappy tales that all have their own reasons and no two unhappy tales are alike, which may be why some of us simply cannot get enough. Alas, there were happy stories within the bigger story. Edie Burchill and her Mom start anew, a fresh new beginning.

Of the characters from this book, I felt most sorry not for Juniper, or Saphie or even Tom. I felt the most compassion for the least likable character of all - very unusual for me - for Percy Blythe. The weight of responsibility and guilt that she chose to carry, to be the rock for everyone, to take the blame, the hide the true horrors but choose to carry them in her own heart for 50+ years, now that took a level of love and sacrifice that deserved recognition.

If you enjoy the London, Kent / England settings, the flashbacks to times of war, both the Great War and WWII, and getting transported into a time and era that makes you feel as if you are there with the characters, if you can appreciate characters who love writing and creating and imagining and dreaming, and if you can appreciate the complexity of relationships between sisters, twins, mothers and daughters, then you may just love this book. I know that I did.

And now I have to decide if I can take a break after completing four Kate Morton books and move on to a new author or if The House at Riverton is next on my list. What do you think?

Whoa! I almost never give a 5-star review for any book, even if I love it, unless it is truly exceptional. While slow to get started, this story was a fantastic read! The language and descriptions used by the author for even the simplest of events flowed like water - smooth and beautiful. Incredibly well-written. Moody, dark, atmospheric, pensive and much of it in a castle setting. What more could you ask for?

I read a lot of memoirs and historical fiction and am used to a book going back and forth in time, but this one wasn't choppy as many of them are, and it was easy to follow. The characters were all well-developed. Nobody was forgotten. Awesome!

My friend passed this across the table and promised a trio of spinsters, a creaky castle and long hidden family secrets. I probably should not have taken the book, seeing as it’s roughly a million pages long and I read at a slugs pace, but I was sold anyway because I’m nosy and books with dark secrets cannot be turned away.

This book kept luring me in with a whole lot of promises of secrets. But then it delivered nothing but a whole lot of empty promises until about page 4 million and 80. Then the twists and turns come fast and furiously but for me it was a little too little and all far too late.

From here on out, I will never ignore my instincts to DNF.

So on to the good. For those with more patience for slow moving books than I, this story is very atmospheric and I have to admit that there was something about it that kept me reading. It starts off with a letter that leads a woman to delve into the past of her mom and her relationship to three sisters who live in a castle. She’s nosy like me. I liked her. There’s a smidge of romance and the promise of dastardly deeds and perhaps a murder. There were many points where I zombie read and had to flip back a few pages but it always managed to re-hook me. The characters are also a quirky bunch and I liked that.

So, I’d say this is a good choice for a gloomy rainy day (week, month?) if you like mysterious books where the castle is more of a character than many of the living, breathing characters within. But you must have endless patience and I clearly do not.

A rundown castle, tightly held family secrets and a literary mystery lie at the center of this novel. Throw in a long lost letter, forbidden romance, family madness and ghostly whispers in the dark and you get a gothic style mystery which would be the perfect book to read by the fire on a stormy night.

The book kicks off in 1992 when a letter posted during the war arrives for Meredith Burchill. For the first time, her daughter Edie learns that her mother was evacuated from London for 18 months during World War 2. Meredith spent that time living in Milderhurst Castle in Kent, home to the famous writer Raymond Blythe and his three daughters. Blythe's claim to fame is that he penned a book which became a children's classic: The True History of the Mud Man. This also happens to be Edie's favorite book. Edie visits the castle and meets with the three daughters, now elderly ladies. She has an unnerving encounter with the youngest daughter, Juniper, which makes her realize that there are some dark family secrets which her mother may be a part of. Why have the sisters never left the castle? What had tormented Raymond Blythe in his final years? Is Juniper's madness purely because her fiance jilted her 40 years previously? Why was Raymond Blythe so secretive about the origins of his book?

The story then jumps back to 1941, and from there it moves between the past and the present day. Kate Morton does a skillful job of gradually peeling back layers of the onion, so that the true story is gradually pieced together over the course of the book. What this does mean however it that it takes quite a while to get going. The early chapters have a lot of background information which takes a while to become relevant. There are several mysteries to be revealed, and while I was able to guess at some of them, I was completely wrong about others. Morton also does a terrific job of bringing the forbidding castle to life. There are a few genuinely creepy moments, although for the most part it's intriguing rather than chilling.

I tossed up between 3 and 4 stars. At times I felt that the book was overlong, too contrived and reliant on coincidences. However the way it comes together is ultimately very satisfying. A good story, cleverly told.

Edie Burchill loves her mother but has a somewhat distant relationship with her. They're too different. She's pursued her own life, and is now assistant chair at the tiny publishing house where she works.

It's so tiny that she and her boss are the only employees, now that the boss's partner and co-founder has died, but they have a well-earned reputation for producing quality books.

What Edie doesn't know is that her mother is more like her than she imagines, and there's a secret in her past that will mean more to Edie than she can imagine.

One day, Edie drives out to a meeting with a new client, and on the way back runs into heavy traffic, gets off the main road, and winds up taking a wrong turn that takes her to a little village which includes a castle--a strangely familiar castle. She's been there before, as a young child, with her mother. They stood outside the gates for a while, and then her mother, Meredith, says she's made a mistake, it's too late, hurries Edie away, and when Edie asks about it, insists it never happened.

It's the beginning of a journey of discovery, self-discovery and family history discovery. Her mother's secrets, and the secrets of the Blythe family. The last of the family are three sisters: Persephone (Percy), her twin sister Seraphina (Saffy), and their younger sister, Juniper. It's also the story of Thomas Cavill, who was first Meredith's teacher and then a soldier during the Second World War, who falls in love with Juniper, and then inexplicably disappears.

Throughout the novel is wound the story of Raymond Blythe and his most successful literary work, The True History of the Mud Man, a bestselling book that became a children's classic, a hit play, and a beloved favorite of Edie in her childhood--part of the reason, she feels, that she became an editor in a literary-oriented publishing firm.

The untangling of all these tangled threads is slow but compelling, with Edie, her mother Meredith, the Sisters Blythe, and even the "minor" characters all coming to matter deeply.

Recommended.

I bought this book.

I will always have a special place in my heart for this book. Yes it’s long but the way Kate weaves the many strands together for a shocking finale was just genius to me. I loved the whole idea of a children’s story being written in a castle, the sisters still alive and living there and a long lost letter finding its way. Kate’s writing is magical and lyrical and I was so excited to spend so much time in this castle. I could see and feel every emotion as Edie starts to talk to the sisters and find out more about her mum’s time there. The past and present threads were just superb – very spmooth and the events which linked up in ways I never could have imagined made this a very fine read and one that reminded me of Enid Blyton, Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens and Agatha Christie all at once.

The way in which the story of the mudman was told at the beginning and then revealed later on was a moment every reader should savour. This is storytelling at its finest and the proof of a very creative and clever mind.

It was so full of atmosphere and emotion – a old gothic castle, a long lost letter, three old sisters, a childhood story and those distant hours. This story has stayed with me ever since. Very very cleverly done.

I've read four other novels by Kate Morton and enjoyed them all, especially The Forgotten Garden, which I loved.

But oh how I hate this book, which I am listening to as an audiobook. For the first 10 hours (it's 22 hours long) I just mourned that Kate Morton did not bother to edit it as it went on and on and on in the most tedious and unnecessary way. For the last twelve hours the plot finally began to advance but I found the Blythe family to be monstrous. I have 22 minutes left but I'm not sure I can finish. I took nothing from this book--not language, not experience, not wisdom--nothing.

Kate Morton is now at the top of my list of favourite authors. She is one of the few that can tell a gripping story and write beautiful prose. I am also unable to predict the ending of her books, which I really appreciate. She drops subtle hints, but never enough to give away the story. She does have common themes running through some of her stories, such as fathers coming home from war and dealing with PTSD, for instance. And hidden dead bodies discovered later. etc. I can't wait for her new book to come out in October.

This review and more at fortheloveoftheread.blogspot.com

First of all, what a lovely, well-written book. This is my first by Kate Morton (although I own all of her other books), and I think I made a good first choice. She tells the story always in third person, but she does switch her focus between the characters, which adds a level of depth to the story that does wonders for it.

The present is 1992, when Edie's mother Meredith receives the letter and Edie begins researching and poking into the past. The story bounces between the present, when Edie is learning more about what happened, and the past, the events as they are happening. The way the author went about sharing both the past and the present was interesting, and I enjoyed reading the events the way they happened, but also hearing in the present how things were told. This also added a level of suspense to the story because the narrators of the present are not as reliable as the facts of the past. The time period is one that interests me as I enjoy reading stories about World War II. Although there isn't a lot about the war in this book, there are key elements to this story that would have been different with a different time period.

The blurb does not mention this, but a huge factor in Edie's curiosity about Milderhurst and the Blythe sisters is a childhood book that was written by their father, Raymond Blythe. Edie fell in love with his book The True History of the Mud Man, and that love for the book pushes her to continue in her pursuit of learning more about the past, including the inspiration for the book.

There are so many secrets in this book, some small but some astronomical, and the author reveals everything by the end of the novel. The reader learns about the night Juniper was jilted and why that affected her so tragically, about Meredith's own past, about the origins of the book. We get a piece of it all, to the point where the story is well wrapped up in the end.

That being said, this is not a happy story. The secrets of the past hold tragedies that have altered the lives of the Blythe sisters, and not for the better. This is not a book that leaves you smiling at the end; however, it is a lovely book that tells a fantastic story. I often enjoy the stories that make me sad more than the stories that make me happy, and this one was a very good book. I am looking forward to reading Morton's other books.

This is a guest review from my wonderful daughter-in-law, Jennifer Ohlarik:

Kate Morton spins a tale of gothic measure in her 2010 novel, 'The Distant Hours'. Spinster twin sisters, Percy and Saffy Blythe, are living within the ever-dilapidating walls of their once vibrant castle. Since the hauntingly gruesome death of their mother and their father's ultimate mental and physical demise, the elderly sisters are charged with the care of their intrinsically beautiful, yet wild younger sister, Juniper, who possesses the same ethereal and charming characteristics as Coleridge's `Christabel'. It is set in the late 1930's and early 1940's in England during a time of bombings, evacuees, gas masks, and blackouts. At the heart of the story is Raymond Blythe's published work entitled "The True History of the Mud Man". Raymond was the trio's father. The tale unravels a world of mystery, secrets, and sins committed within the stone and mortar walls of Milderhurst Castle.

Edie, a young publisher from London is enraptured by "The True History of the Mud Man" only later to find out that her mother, Meredith, shares a secret connection to this English Castle and it's inhabitants. As a young girl, Meredith was sequestered to Milderhurst Castle as an evacuee. She grew close to Juniper and learned to write at the hand of Raymond Blythe. The tie between the two elderly sisters; the dominance and submissive parts played by each respective twin, woven and connected to the younger carefree spirit of the wild Juniper is intensely fascinating, as is the strong possessiveness and oppressiveness of the castle walls. Morton tells a story of forbidden love, family loyalty, family ties - or rather chains, which ultimately revolves around this mysterious monster that arises from the mud.

This book contains wonderful surprises and revelations that are delivered with gentleness and ease. The plot is multi-layered with a strong foundation. Page after page, Morton carefully paints a picturesque English countryside and develops characters that are real, with whom we can come to know, understand, and ultimately empathize. It's a story of past and present, with subtle glimmers of hopeful futures. It's nostalgically rich in it's gothic feeling lending the reader's mind to reminisce the Bronte sisters' works. The novel has many references to the great writers and poets. Emerson and Poe are two of the family dogs. It's a warm friend for any reader with strong inclinations towards the world of British classics. Intertwined with mentions of the great writers, Morton also creates humorous charm with her allusions to Alice in Wonderland.

The Distant Hours is a meticulously crafted story that that entrances the reader until the last page.

The final denouement of THE DISTANT HOURS has left me thinking this must be the most original writing piece I have had the pleasure to read in quite a while! You know you have discover an exceptional novel when there are so many twists and turns to the plot you hold your breath, leaving you with this feeling of awe at the scope of the author's imagination!

There are countless adjectives one could apply to describe Kate Morton's novel, from intriguing to momentous, a phenomenon in this day and age when so many novels feels spieled in a minimum of time but I will emphasise singular! This is one book you will be loath to put down!

Written with elements of an epistolary novel (the poly logic type which creates a dramatic tension throughout the plot), the novel alternates betwixt the late 1930's, the 1940's and the 1990's. The plot line is to be experienced for its originality as nothing will prepare you for its final phase.

THE DISTANT HOURS with its discerning cast of characters, each cleverly described, will remind of the saying: "All is fair in love and war'.
We have a compelling Milderhurst Castle with its moat filled in, Percy, Saffy and Juniper, the three spinsters sisters in residence, their reclusive and eccentric father, Raymond Blythe, a writer with his best seller 'The True History Of The Mud Man' the pivot of the story.

Multi layered, this haunting story involves also a young evacuee and a missing person in wartime, and finally our narrator, the young editor/publisher who stumbles on her mother's mysterious past which seemed strangely connected to Milderhurst' s deep secrets and its inhabitants...

Spanning decades and fabulously rich in historical facts and suspense, this novel depicts the true extent of friendship, love, hate all carefully intertwined with loyalty and duty.

Australian author Kate Morton has definitively earned 5+ stars for this interesting novel and I am eagerly looking forward to read her three other novels (as well as whatever she can come up with!)

Note to Readers: This review was not requested and therefore represents ONLY my opinion!

How do you criticize great writing? You don't. But you can have an opinion on what didn't work in it FOR YOU, rather than singing with the choir all the things that were wonderful.

Morton is a great writer. Her description paragraphs nail setting, plot, etc. I feel like I am walking with the narrator through the castle, on to the property...

My one complaint is something "I" was instructed not to do in writing classes. OVER describe. Morton is SO in love with the written language, sometimes, for me, she seems to tell too much. Most writers don't tell enough, but Morton IMHO needs to edit some of that fabulous language. Not all of it, just some of it. At one point in the novel, I felt I'd already read that chapter. I couldn't quite pinpoint where or how, but I knew I'd heard this before. This is, of course, the design of shifting narrators, one telling their story, another discovering that story, but the actual words were familiar. I didn't feel this way about The House at Riverton. THAT novel was much more tightly edited, IMHO.

Not to criticize Morton in particular. THIS might be a trend. I felt several popular works of fiction in the last few years needed serious editing. The Host by Meyer, mann, cut a third woman! Even a few Harry Potters seemed a bit long in the tooth on description. I'd read it earlier in an earlier novel. I chalked it up to the absolute frenzy Rowling had to write to satisfy her hoards of fans. And maybe even her publisher barking at her heels! FASTER, FASTER, DEADLINE!!! The gripping fear that the phenom would end before the series did would account for this, I suspect.

But this isn't so with Morton. Each of her novels is unique and stands alone. And although there is a drive to write fast and publish sooner, I think she has more ... time ... to edit the richness of her text.

Maybe the new school of editorial assistants allow their massively creative authors more flexibility. After all, no one but the writer knows what it is that drives their story. I've often thought books in another era were as much written by the editor as the author (Gone With The Wind?, Ulysses?). Not fair, but that's what I've thought.

With The Distant Hours, I've put the book down for days, not something I did with Riverton. I'm still fascinated by Edie's tale, or is it really Juniper's tale?...I wanted to know what happened, but sigh, I could wait until I picked it up again.

I'm now at the eleventh hour, and I don't know how it will end. I have suspicions...and hopeful of a zinger at the end. I'm leaving all that for tonight...or even tomorrow, yawn, if I don't get to it tonight. I love the writing, I even like the supernatural and gothic style of the book (my absolute favorites are these...The Thirteenth Tale, Her Fearful Symmetry, The Eight, anything by Poe, most by Susan Hill).

So I think a 4 not a 5 is closer to what I mean, but maybe a 4 1/2 star rating.

Read this if you read other Kate Morton books. Heck, read it even if you don't read other Kate Morton books. Just ... well, I dunno, just know she's been better. A bit. ;0)

From the first pages, readers are captured by the dark tale of the Mud Man, the book within the story. It has all the haunting charm of a Gothic novel, a house wherein lie the: “stones of Milderhurst Castle, beneath whose skin the distant hours were whispering, watching.”(452) It parallels the lives of several women, all closely connected by the castle, Raymond Blythe, the author of The True History of the Mud Man, and the tragedies and inner demons that haunt all who live or love those who lived at Milderhurst. Edith Burchill is asked by the owner of her small editing company to interview the twin sisters (who also will later narrate their stories) Saffy and Percy Blythe, who live with their baby sister, the town lunatic, Juniper. The three are now elderly woman who once housed Edith’s own mother during the London raids of WW1, and each sister bears her own secret burden that she still conceals from the others. This story is told from the various perspectives of each of the women and the two men who connect them all, in order to create a perfectly overlapping history of what has happened within the last century at Milderhurst. The Distant Hours is a leap into the past and deep revelation of human nature that will only create an addiction as the reader seeks to discover the true ending.

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This book should have been a great book. Ms. Morton has a wonderful story and I loved the way she leads the reader to believe one thing yet once we see the same event from another character's point of view we get a fuller idea of what actually happened. That being said at times her writing style was almost distractingly overwrought, dialogue was brilliant but there were far too many pages and pages of "telling" versus showing (an old writing axiom) and finally one of her plot twist/double turns bordered on the ridiculous.

Just say no to adjectives:
I understood the first few pages were suppose to be from a novel written in the style of different time period, however Ms. Morton continues this at times for her more current passages. In one section she mentions the sound of another character's reaction "The horrid, guttural gasp, followed quickly by a series of rasping sobs that swamped the air..." The character was not being strangled, but opening a long lost letter. Another description: "A round pool meditated at the center and the pair of fat geese had launched themselves across the sun-warmed surface, floating regally now as ripples chased one another towards the flagstone edges." (and yes, my punctuation is correct - that is all one sentence) I'm not sure how a pool would meditate, but I reckon fat geese launching themselves across it would wreck its chi. I found myself skipping forward in pages to avoid all this over-writing which was not good - as mentioned, the story was a good one!

Logic matters:
Slight spoiler alert: toward the end of the book the main character finds a portion of a letter written in 1916ish. Now the letter is fairly sophisticated in its content and writing style: "Never before has your writing taken the reader on such a vivid journey... I couln't help noticing, however, as I read the manuscript...". Within a few pages you find out who wrote the letter, however something about it put the story off kilter for me. I realized from piecing together some of the convoluted dates and events that the letter was written by another character when she would have been about 10 years of age.

One "twist" too many:
Last but not least, something thrown in that really did the whole story a disservice. I did enjoy how differing points of view gave the reader a better understanding of what happens throughout the book - those "ah hah!" moments were brilliant. However, the true reason one character ends up with mysterious blood stains on her blouse was far fetched and very dissappointing (this is revealed toward the end of the book).

The story and its moving back and forth between the 1940s and 1990s was very well done. I have not read her first book and will absolutely do so. What I'm wondering is with Ms. Morton's previous success that her editors backed off on the copy editing, when she would have greatly benefited from some tightening and a bit of plot refining.

If I only read one book this fall, I decided months ago, it would have to be The Distant Hours by Kate Morton. Kate Morton's debut novel, The House of Riverton, held me so spellbound that as soon as I finished it, I read it again. Despite the fact that The House of Riverton left me emotionally drained, I eagerly pre-ordered her next novel, The Forgotten Garden, and devoured it in one sitting, heedless of the late hour and lack of sleep, when it finally came. I'm glad to report that her third effort, The Distant Hours, was just as compulsively readable and captivating as the first two.

Everything I loved in The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden, and have come to expect from Kate Morton, is in The Distant Hours.

First, there's always a mystery that unfolds in lush, gothic detail, usually in a bygone era. Here, a letter sent during World War II arrives 50 years later. Like a siren call from the past, Edie is compelled to find Milderhurst Castle and discover the fate of the Sisters Blythe, Juniper, Persephone, and Seraphina. Aristocratic beauties in their day, what has happened to the Sisters Blythe over the years and what precipitated their tragic decay reminds me a bit of Grey Gardens mixed with We Have Always Lived at the Castle. So lovely and promising in their youth, they are now old women who never escaped the mouldy castle of their forebears, their dreams strangled by a mysterious tragedy 50 years before.

"Have you ever wondered what the stretch of time smells like? I can't say I had, not before I set foot inside Milderhurst Castle, but I certainly know now. Mould and ammonia, a pinch of lavender and a fair whack of dust, the mass disintergration of very old sheets of paper. And there's something else too, something underlying it all, something verging on rotten or stewed but not. It took me a while to work out what that smell was, but I think I know now. It's the past. Thoughts and dreams, hopes and hurts, all brewed together, shifting in the stagnant air, unable to dissipate completely."

The long shadows cast by their controlling father, a celebrated novelist, and his most famous work, The True History of the Mud Man, over their lives has something to do with why the Sisters Blythe have never left the castle. Morton, as usual, is adept at weaving subtle strands and hints so that even as the reader uncovers more and more of the mystery, the final reveal is devastating and unexpected. Hint - within the short, haunting excerpt from the Mud Man tale in the beginning of the book are symbolic clues as to the dark history and future of the Sisters Blythe.

Love affairs cut tragically short; age-old secrets waiting to be discovered; suspenseful, atmospheric setting; and writing that left me breathless - The Distant Hours enthralled me to the very end.

I'm going to write my review in terms of dichotomies.

Kate Morton definitely has writing in her bones.

Why this is good: The prologue is an excerpt from The True History of the Mud Man (a story that one character in the book writes). What a way to suck the reader in! Throughout the story, her descriptions of things like the weather, the castle, the characters, are worded so perfectly.

Why this is bad: Every character in the book is a writer. Well, not Percy. But every other main character is. Edie is (okay, technically she doesn't write, but she works in publishing and is obsessed with books), and her mother Meredith is. The other two Blythe sisters are. The Blythe father is. Writers tend to write about what they know, so it was smart for Morton to not venture into unknown territory. But seriously? Does she not have any other interests or hobbies that she has any knowledge of? I felt like I was in this word vortex, and reading and writing was about all that existed in any of these characters' lives.

Morton chose an unusual setting for this novel.

Why this is good: It takes a skilled writer to make the setting into a character in its own right, and Morton did this splendidly. Plus, who doesn't like reading a story that takes place in a castle?

Why this is bad: The concept of living in a castle didn't quite seem fully fleshed out. I kept waiting for her to explain exactly how it came to be that three more or less ordinary women (high class, but don't appear to be royalty) just happened to wind up being born and raised in a castle. It's an unusual enough home that I think it demands some sort of history as to why the house was built and how it was passed down, but no explanation was ever given.

Morton writes long books.

Why this is good: Most books end around 350 pages. Morton's books are just getting good around that point, and as a reader I'm desperately longing for there to be a good chunk left to read, and it's so nice of Morton to accommodate me in that manner.

Why this is bad: Morton's books don't really pick up until halfway through. I have to spend an awful lot of time slogging through only halfway interesting text before I get to the good stuff.

Recommended overall? No. There was too much filler and not enough meat.

I'm not sure I can explain how much I truly enjoyed reading this book without selling it short. It took me a very long time to read, not only because school started and I've been busy working, but also because Kate Morton's prose is so beautiful and extravagant that I treated every sentence like a bite of hot fudge sundae, spending extra time savoring and digesting. The story starts off rather slowly, with the entrance of Edie, the narrator, divulging into her relationship with her mother, Meredith, and setting the stage of the Blythe sisters, who undoubtedly steal the show. Set half in flashbacks and half in present tense, the life stories of Juniper, Saffie, Percy, Edie, Meredith, and even the castle itself are captivating and intriguing. The mystery of Edie trying to unveil the sisters' closely guarded secrets of their famous father's past and their own loves and losses kept me at the edge of my seat to see how she used what she learned of the sisters to understand her own mother's upbringing as a London evacuee at Milderhurst Castle during WWII. This beautiful tale is one that I know I will be reading over and over again!.

Edie Burchill is intrigued when her mother receives a letter lost in the mail for 50 years and her mother has an odd reaction that she won't explain, at least not in a way that seems satisfactory to Edie. She does learn that her mother had been evacuated from London as a child during World War II and taken out to the country, where she ended up living with a young woman and her twin older sisters in their castle.
Edie probably would have let the mysterious reaction slide except for the fact that one day she runs across Milderhurst Castle when she gets lost in the country, and her fascination -- almost obsession -- with the castle, its inhabitants and her mother's past begins. With some sleuthing, she begins to learn about the now aged spinster sisters, Percy, Saffy and Juniper Blythe, and their author father who wrote a famous scary story called The True History of the Mud Man. She learns about the tragedies that befell the family at the castle and even gets to meet the sisters on a tour of the home.
As Edie learns bit by bit about the history of the castle and its inhabitants, including her mother, the reader gets to learn about each character 50 years earlier; the narrative goes back and forth between the past and the present (well, technically, 1992). Information, personalities and motivations are revealed, and mysteries are slowly solved.
Kate Morton, author of "The Forgotten Garden" and "The House at Riverton", has penned another lovely novel with engaging characters and gothic secrets that keeps the reader hanging on until the last page. For those who enjoyed her other books and for any fans of gothic literature, this is a must-read.
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I always love a Kate Morton story. My favorite was Forgotten Garden, but this was also very entertaining-which is why we read fiction. It was her trademark multigenerational mystery with a touch of a love story. It was long and I read it slowly, little by little, under the covers on windy cold nights. Just as I think it was meant to be read. After her mother receives a 50 year lost letter, Edie travels to the castle in the English countryside where her mother stayed during the war to escape the Blitz in London. A mystery unfolds and and eventually is solved and all strings tied up nicely.

"A life, Miss Burchill, a human life, is bracketed by a pair of events: one's birth and one's death. The dates of those events belong to a person as much as their name, as much as the experiences that happen in between." This statement, one directed at the book's protagonist during a prolonged and earth-shattering confession, may as well be a central point of description in a plot summary for "The Distant Hours", the third and most intricately layered novel yet from Australian author Kate Morton. It is literary fiction and mystery together, the formation and arrangement of the story's building blocks and lead-ins to the numerous secrecies within its pages painstaking and incredibly rewarding.

Edith Burchill loves books; hers is a long and somewhat guilty affair that began with her confiscation of the local library's copy of "The True History of the Mud Man", a macabre tale penned by famed author Raymond Blythe. Blythe once inhabited the resplendent Milderhurst Castle, a grand property now suffering from neglect, unpleasant memories, and the curious and intensely private natures of his three elderly daughters (Persephone aka Percy, Seraphina aka Saffy, Juniper). Edith's occupation with a small publishing house and obsession with the Mud Man and Milderhurst expands when her mother Meredith, a transitory resident of the castle during WWII, receives a letter that opens many old and creaking doors, their squeaks and groans the songs of confession of which Meredith speaks ("Ancient walls that sing the distant hours"). Of particular interest to Edith is her mother's former friendship with Juniper, a woman rumored to have gone mad after her fiancée failed to show for dinner one fateful stormy evening. Contracted to write a piece on the Blythe family, Edith visits the castle and has an encounter with Juniper that shakes her to the core; when seeking answers as to the reasons behind Juniper's psychosis, she is rebuffed time and again by the unyielding Percy. She experiences much of the same when asking her mother about Milderhurst, the strong intent on everyone's part to keep their secrets about the place only encouraging Edith to dig ever deeper for the truth. What she finds out will be the light upon the myriad shadows surrounding the Blythe family, including the dark and tragic inspiration behind the tale she so loves.

Morton is an absolutely exceptional author, her stories rich with complicated and fascinating characters, places full of intrigue and tragedy, and resonating with powerful themes. There is many a veil of secrecy in "The Distant Hours", each with its fine fabric of lies and concealment expertly and tightly woven by its makers. There is jealousy, rage, and infidelity, all of which bear seed in the Mud Man's morbid conception. There are the intangible and indivisible ties of family, bonds so strong they threaten to break yet mend themselves time and again through unconditional love. There is romantic love and the heartache that comes in tandem. There is madness, death and the ineradicable annals of one's own personal history. Though there is no possibility for one character's reparation in wrongdoing, there is still relief and forgiveness to be had in confession, that things have been set right at long last, giving the reader a sense of closure. Morton keeps this all together with a story that ebbs and flows, her build-ups sometimes a small torment but always keeping the reader on the edge, hungry for discovery and swooning over her concise, sincere and reflective delivery.

I have give to credit for a fascinating story within a story here: after reading the "excerpt" from The True History of the Mud Man that is used as the opening, I found myself every bit as entranced as Edith by the story; I felt as though it were an actual existing book, what with all the compelling history Morton attaches to it, and it made me wish that it was real so that I could read it in its entirety. She says this of its inception: "The portion of Raymond's Blythe's rather spooky story came to me in a flash, on a cold, wet winter's evening. I was alone in a cabin in the forest, mist had rolled up the mountain, and I was sitting by the window watching night fall. All of a sudden I was struck by an image of a young girl perched upon a bookcase at the top of a castle tower. She was looking over a dark landscape, dreaming about her future, when down below her, deep in the muddy moat, something began to stir. I raced to my computer and wrote the prologue in a single sitting. All the other pieces of the puzzle slotted into place once I found my Mud Man." Color me a deep and brilliant shade of intrigued. Perhaps at some point she will consider penning this story in its entirety as a nice side project for her most devoted fans.

Bottom line: A captivating read from beginning to end, "The Distant Hours" will sing of your time spent reading it with each page turned in eagerness, its swan dive into the idea of "if these walls could talk" having the most curious of our lot wondering freely on the spirits that whisper their secrets within each ancient edifice, and whether or not they can be heard if we listen hard enough.

Quite by chance, thirty something book editor Edie Burchill discovers that her mother, twelve years old at the start of WWII, was evacuated to ancient Milderhurst Castle in Kent. Since her mom vehemently refuses to talk about it, Edie sets off to discover why. She travels to Milderhurst and arranges for a tour, where she meets the now elderly - and eccentric - Blythe sisters, daughters of famous author Raymond Blythe. A strong sense of deja vu overtakes her during her visit to the decaying edifice, and she reluctantly departs with more questions than answers. When a few weeks later Edie's offered an opportunity to write the preface to a new edition of Blythe's The True History of the Mudman, her favorite childhood novel, she eagerly accepts, and finds herself immersed in a tangled web of mystery.

Narrated from multiple viewpoints, The Distant Hours is an outstanding example of modern gothic fiction. It contains all the requisite elements, from spooky setting and enigmatic characters to madness, tragic accidents, and murky mysteries. Author Morton commendably restrains herself from going over the top, never sacrificing subtlety for blatant effect. This is prose that captivates. Slightly reminscent in style of duMaurier's Rebecca, Hours is just as compulsively readable and memorable. The truth very gradually yields itself up to Edie's relentless research, not to mention courage, with the biggest surprise - shocking yet wholly believable - withholding itself until the very end.

This is a writer who keeps getting better. On my list of top five reads of 2012.

Fans of Kate Morton will surely love this book. As with her previous novels, she has woven a truly compelling tale overflowing with mysterious themes which capture the reader's interest. Reality and unreality conjoin like twin shadows, often forcing the reader to question what is feigned and what is bona fide, what is the result of madness and what is rational, who is sane and who is not. It was sometimes hard to separate fact from fancy.
This is the story of a family scarred by the horrors of war, unrequited love, heartbreak, scandals, secrets and madness. Ruled by a patriarch determined to protect his ancestral castle, he exerts enormous control over his descendants, even from beyond the grave.
The Blythe offspring have been cloistered for most of their lives within the confines of the castle. Twins, Persephone and Seraphina, and a younger sibling, Juniper, progeny of two different mothers, inhabit a world often created by their own imagination, hence sometimes intersecting with the real world in disharmony. Their lives and loves are hidden within the confines of the castle's stone walls.
Meredith Baker is a victim of wartime displacement. At age 14, she is moved with many children, to the countryside, where they will live with host families because their parents fear it is too dangerous for them to remain in London. Separated from her siblings, she is sent to live in a castle, with the Blythe children and their father, Raymond, a famous author. At Milderhurst Castle she discovers her true desires and blossoms.
The story begins years later. Meredith is married and in her 65th year. Stoic and secretive, she has never revealed her castle experience to her daughter, and when a letter from the past, from that time of her life, unexpectedly arrives so many years later, she opens up a sliver of light into her hidden background because of the profound reaction the letter causes to her state of mind.
The past and present merge as the story unfolds and is developed by Meredith's daughter, Edith, who discovers the actual Milderhurst castle when she gets lost returning from a business trip. The sisters still live there in its state of decay and through her exploration and research, the walls of the castle reveal their mysteries, exposing the tragedies residing there and illuminating the history of the family that lived there.
The characters are wonderfully drawn and images of them are sharp and clear. It is easy to identify with the emotions they experience. Although the first half of this rather lengthy 650+ page book doesn't move that quickly, the second half takes off, and the pages fly. It was hard to put it down as I was completely engaged in the effort to discover how the story would resolve and I was not disappointed. My interest was captured and fulfilled as the secrets were revealed.

***Based on Advanced Readers Copy

For starters I will say that it took me some months to read this book. It started out great, did not hold my interest so much for the middle but did redeem itself in the end. I can't put my finger on why I felt it lagged for me, perhaps it was that it seemed to be taking too long to explain things and get right into the nitty gritty of the secrets I wanted to find the answers for. The last hundred pages or so I would rate higher than the rest of the book, everything I wanted in an ending. I will also say that I read several other books at the same time as reading The Distant Hours and I think it actually made my reading more enjoyable, I was able to appreciate small sections of reading rather than, as when I first started, trying to force that appreciation and enjoyment by reading large sections. In the end the decision to read other books at the same time made my reading of The Distant Hours a good experience instead of feeling like a chore.

I loved the characters, could not pick a favourite. Each and every character was dealing with their own inner problems and trying to solve their own secrets. I was eager to find out the ultimate secret but also to see how Edie and her mother's relationship would develop as Edie uncovered intimate secrets about her mother's past. Fifty years is a long time and a lot of water under the bridge, albeit this water mixed with sand to make mud which stuck to the main characters throughout all their lives.

All in all, for me, it was an okay read. I'm glad I decided to take a more leisurely pace with this one and finish the book instead of racing through it or not finishing it at all. It certainly hasn't deterred me from other works of Kate Morton.

Many thanks to Jess from Allen & Unwin for providing me with a copy of The Distant Hours - thanks, Jess!

This is one long book. And I have to admit, it didn't grab me instantly. But in time, it became one of the most satisfying, gorgeously written tapestries of a story I've ever encountered. It gripped me, moved me deeply and had me turning pages. When it was done, I felt as though I'd stepped out of an entire world of experience. It cast a spell that lingered long after. I highly recommend this book.

The Distant Hours by Kate Morton is a book about three sisters living in a decaying castle that has belonged to their ancestors for centuries; it is about the relationships between mother and daughters, sisters and family. It is a haunting novel about books and how stories that we read as children can inspire the rest of our lives. A book about family secrets, past mistakes shaping future generations that keeps with the same tone and spirit as the classic gothic novels of the 18th and 19th century.

I can't begin to describe how much I loved this book! Kate Morton has become one of my favorite writers and I have enjoyed her other novels, The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden but in my opinion this book surpasses both of the others. I have been saving this read for a while now, waiting until I was in just the right mood to pick it up and I figured that the dead middle of winter would be an excellent time for a good gothic read.

I think one of the strongest aspects of this book is the writing of the book. Kate Morton keeps the same gothic, creepy and suspenseful tone throughout the whole book, and it keeps the readers interested and intrigued. It is very easy to imagine yourself discovering the Milderhurst Castle for the first time right along with Edie. Readers feel the same emotions that the main characters feel while they are feeling them. I also thought that the transitions from one time period to another or from one tense to another was smooth and kept the story going. I noticed that in her earlier books these transitions were not as smooth and there were times I found myself confused but in this book she masters these transitions and when she decides to switch time periods is always the perfect time giving the reader just enough information but not too much. She ties all of the ends to the story well and makes her characters easy to believe and sympathize with.

I would strongly recommend this book to anyone who is looking for the perfect winter read, dark and creepy but with the right amount of plot to keep the story going. I look forward to reading anything that Kate Morton writes because I think she gets better and better as she goes.

Kate Morton's superb 2010 thriller, "The Distant Hours", weaves a complex plot around family secrets in 1992 London and 1941 Milderhurt Castle in Kent, cleverly building to two dramatic and interlinked climaxes. Morton deftly combines elements of historical fiction, gothic horror, and romance in a way that will keep readers tingling in suspense to the final pages.

A preface introduces the chilling horror story of the Mud Man, written by Raymond Blythe of Milderhurst Castle. The story proper gets underway with Edie Burchill, editor at a tiny London publishing house, and her mother Meredith, who receives a letter lost in the mail since 1941. The letter opens up to Edie her mother's undisclosed past, including a wartime evacuation to Milderhurst and links to the author of Edie's favorite book, "The True History of the Mud Man." When a chance drive takes Edie to Kent, she is unable to resist the opportunity to visit the castle and meet the aging Blythe sisters, Percy, Saffy, and Juniper, daughters of Raymond and keepers of his and their own secrets.

The story follows the three sisters during 1941, and Edie's sleuthing in the present of 1992. At stake is the truth about the fate of a British soldier who disappeared on a stormy October night in 1941, forever altering the lives of the Blythe sisters and of Edie's mother Meredith. The fate of the missing soldier may also be a clue to the origins of the Mud Man myth and the madness of its author.

Kate Morton's prose is terrific, doling out the clues to her mysteries while creating rounded and complex characters living in two different eras, some as younger and older versions of themselves. Morton uses all 500 pages of the novel to deliver an absorbing story with a suspenseful finish. "The Distant Hours" is very highly recommended.

I've read several of Kate Morton's novels, as well as countless other novels (I read like a maniac.) This is by far one of my very books I've ever read. Period. The combination of atmosphere, the writing, the characters, and the plot come together to form something magical. This kind of writing simply can't be taught (I majored in Literature and Writing in college, so believe me, I know. If you could teach it, I'd be writing novels instead of reviewing them). What Kate Morton does is beyond any class, great editing, or even experience. While each of those things can make a good story better, they can't manufacture magic. And what Kate Morton does, in all her novels, but especially this one, is magical. I couldn't put it down, and have tried to force every reader I know to pick it up. I am a very picky reader; I will stop reading if the dialogue seems forced or unrealistic, if the characters seem phony or unrelatable, if the prose is boring or wordy or ... you get the idea. This book is fantastic. I devoured it, and look forward to reading it again and again. If you're at all into this type of fiction, you will not regret this one.

First Line: Hush... Can you hear him?

Three elderly sisters live in a crumbling castle in the south of England, closely guarding their secrets, until the chance delivery of a 50-year-old letter to the mother of London book editor, Edie Burchill.

As a teenager, Edie's mother was evacuated to Milderhurst Castle during the Blitz and lived with author Raymond Blythe and his three daughters, twins Persephone and Seraphina, and Juniper. When Edie has an opportunity to read her mother's letter and to learn that her mother actually lived with the author of her favorite children's book, The True History of the Mud Man, she naturally wants to learn all she can about her mother's time there, the castle, and the Blythes. The thick, sticky spiderweb of secrets she blunders into has been in place for decades, and as they are exposed to the light of day, there will be repercussions for them all.

I loved Morton's first two books, The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden. The author's descriptive, atmospheric writing swept me away into these stories for long periods of time, and when I came up for air, I had to blink a few times to bring the world into focus. Not so with The Distant Hours.

With the exception of The True History of the Mud Man-- a children's book written by one of the characters-- which is truly creepy and stirred the hair on the back of my neck, I was never transported by the story. The book felt too much like the gothic romances by Dorothy Eden and Victoria Holt I read as a teenager.

Although Morton's characterizations are as excellent as they were in her first two books, once the cast of characters was in place, it was relatively easy for me to decipher all the secrets and know what happened at Milderhurst Castle. And... since I wasn't transported by the story, the book felt bloated and very slow-moving.

Has this put me off Kate Morton's writing? No. Besides, I really wouldn't call this a "bad" book, merely an average one. I enjoyed her first two books so much that I'll still be watching for the next.

My first introduction to Kate Morton's writing was The House at Riverton. A Gothic tale, told within multiple timelines, and secrets galore, The Distant Hours is no different in that respect.

However, I should start this post by asking you a question: When you were a kid, what was the story that grabbed you? Held you speechless as you turned each page and introduced you to the world of imagination and possibility?

I can think of a few titles that capture this feeling for me, but for Edie in The Distant Hours, there will only ever be one. It is a celebrated classic, one that is a horror story of monumental proportions, but is simultaneously literary. The Mud Man, by Richard Blythe, a tale of horror, intrigue, and disturbing events that shake a young mind to their bones - this is the story that made Edie fall in love with books.

As an adult, she now works in the publishing industry and has a somewhat strained relationship with her parents in which not much is shared about their young lives. Disjointed this may be, Edie is aware that when her mother was a child, she was one of the many evacuees in England during World War II, and was the only one safely stationed at Milderhurst Castle. Already a Gothic and mysterious home it is even more so filled with secrets since this was the home of the very author of The Mud Man. Edie was always curious about her mother's relationship to this castle and the family, and while on a business trip, she decides to take a slight detour and visit the famous castle. While there, she meets the three daughters of Raymond Blythe, now much older while on a tour of the house, and is invited back much later to write the introduction for the release of a new edition of their father's famous story.

Back and forth between the 1930s and the 1990s, and told from different characters' perspectives, this is simply haunting and Gothic, through and through. Where did the story of The Mud Man truly come from? Why is the oldest sister, Percy, so gruff and cold? Why is the youngest, Juniper, still waiting for her fiancé, even though it's been over fifty years? And what really was their relationship with Edie's mother?

Once again, as with The House at Riverton, I find I'm always mesmerized with the mystery, the characters, their sadness, and their regrets. The story is creepy and detailed, and while I thought the end was a bit too nicely wrapped up for this eloquently haunting story, I was absolutely satisfied yet again with Kate Morton's work. I look forward to downloading another audiobook from her, and Caroline Lee as the narrator was extremely impressive. My first time listening to her voice, and I look forward to more.

There is a castle in THE DISTANT HOURS, and a moat, not to mention a deep forest; there is a trio of slightly batty, secretive sisters; there is a likable protagonist --- an editor, passionate about reading --- who goes sleuthing where she shouldn't; and there is one particularly crucial dark and stormy night. There is romance, too, but most of the love affairs lie in the past and are forbidden and/or thwarted.

Like tea and toast in the morning, the elements of a satisfying gothic novel are reliably present in every one of Kate Morton's books (I've read all three), making them the sort of reading material you count on to see you through a country weekend, a bout of insomnia, or an overnight flight. Call it Comfort Fiction.

I heaved a contented sigh when this novel began with an intriguing, slightly bone-chilling excerpt from the mysterious fairy tale that is a key factor in the plot. I adore children's fantasies, so I identified immediately with the narrator's love of books. I am mad for England, especially the World War II era, so I was thrilled that this novel jumps back and forth between the late 1930s and early 1940s, and 1992. And I have always wanted to live (or at least read and write) in a turret.

The story is complicated, but here is the short(ish) version. Edith (Edie) Burchill, a young Londoner, discovers that her mother was one of the children sent to the countryside for protective purposes during the Blitz --- specifically, she landed at Milderhurst Castle in Kent. Shortly thereafter, Edie finds herself in the neighborhood of the castle and realizes that its late owner, Raymond Blythe, wrote her favorite childhood book, a classic called The True History of the Mud Man (Morton's invention but entirely credible, it's about a fearsome Black Lagoon-type creature emerging from the moat and clambering up the tower where a young girl dreams and waits). She visits Milderhurst and its current residents, Raymond Blythe's daughters: gruff, chain-smoking Persephone (Percy); her pretty, timid twin, Seraphina (Saffy); and Juniper, their sister by Raymond's second marriage, an inspired writer and fragile soul who has episodes of violence and memory loss.

The Blythes have a very chequered past. Raymond's mother (fell from tower) and first wife (burned alive) expire under suspicious and dramatic circumstances; in his later years, he becomes paranoid and uncharacteristically religious, and he, too, falls to his death. Percy, Saffy and Juniper have all loved and lost, though Morton is canny about not revealing the precise details of their respective tragedies until the end of the book. As Edie pursues these mysteries (ostensibly to research the introduction to a new edition of The True History of the Mud Man), she finds that her mother, Meredith, who became Juniper's confidante during her stay at the castle, is herself mixed up in the family's intimate history.

Indeed, I found the relationship between Edie and her mother the most compelling feature of THE DISTANT HOURS. In her youth, Meredith has literary inclinations, and at Milderhurst she is encouraged in this by the Blythes --- until her rather unimaginative parents haul her back to London. She grows up to become a conventional wife and mother, but now, as her daughter delves into the past, we see Meredith morph back into the creative spirit she once was (though not without a great deal of initial resistance). Morton handles this transformation with delicacy and compassion. Even Edie's stolid father becomes engaged in the hunt for the truth behind Blythe's celebrated book. Who is the Mud Man, and what does it all mean?

I don't want to say too much more, because the success of Morton's work depends on a series of carefully timed revelations. However, they struck me as somewhat anticlimactic simply because there are so many of them. In striving to show how family secrets, conflicts and patterns resonate over the generations, Morton makes her story denser and more repetitive than necessary. Although Edie is the principal voice, each of the sisters, their father and Edie's mother also narrate episodes from 40 years back, and soon we are awash in jilted women, ardent writers and guilty memories. It feels like overkill to me.

The good thing about Morton's work is that she evokes the finest prose traditions and thereby elevates what could have been a jejune romance into something more substantial. She summons the reader's intensely emotional relationship to books like JANE EYRE and REBECCA (madwomen or -men in attics, great houses going up in flames, and so forth); and her plot devices, frequently more convenient than believable, recall Dickens. But this is a two-edged sword. Although Morton's writing has flashes, indeed whole passages, of brilliance, it isn't on the same level as the masters upon whom she patterns herself. At times she lapses into howlers ("greedy greenery"; "his heart splurting") that I wish a keen-eyed editor had caught.

I know that Morton is capable of more than well-crafted diversions. She has the talent (and perhaps needs the courage) to write a less predictable, less derivative book. I'm thinking of novels that draw on the gothic tradition but also transcend it, such as Sarah Waters's THE LITTLE STRANGER or Jean Rhys's stunning JANE EYRE prequel, WIDE SARGASSO SEA. Like all literary "children," Morton wants to carry on the heritage of the great storytellers of the past. But perhaps it is time to take that legacy into fresh territory. Now that would really be a treat.

--- Reviewed by Kathy Weissman

A young woman's mother receives a lost letter in the mail from 50 years prior, and so begins a mystery she simply must sort out. She discovers her mother had been evacuated during WWII from London to the country to Milderhurst Castle, in the company of 3 rather eccentric sisters. Meeting the elderly sisters - whose father just happens to have been the author of her favorite novel when she was a child - intrigues her even more.

This story jumps around quite a bit and, for me, that made it just a bit confusing at times, but I still enjoyed it. There were times when I felt it was a bit long and could have benefited from a better job of editing (hence the 4 stars), but still the journey was a good one. There is a good mystery here and it was enjoyable to sort it out.

One thing that truly irked me was the names given to the characters. The sisters names are Persephone, Seraphina, and Juniper. With the first two nicknamed Percy and - truly - Saffy. Really?? I kept really that last one as Taffy. And Juniper? A real stretch for the names. Whatever happened to Elizabeth and Ann and Mary? Anyway, beyond the names and the bit of length, I enjoyed the author's storytelling ability and her use of language. She kept entertained and engaged and wanting to know what was coming next!

From page one I knew that I would love this book, and upon finishing it (at 1:30 in the morning, while I was sick, after reading it for three nights) I promptly went out and bought all of Morton's other books.

The story begins when Edie Burchill's mother, Meredith, who has always been emotionally inaccessible to Edie, receives a letter in 1992 that had been buried in a closet since 1941, that reduces her to tears. Edie is shocked by her mother's reaction and wonders what it is from her mother's past that has cast such a long and enduring shadow over her life.

It's not long after that Edie finds Milderhurst Castle, the ancient castle that has cast the shadow. It is the former residence of Raymond Blythe, the famed, reclusive author of Edie's favorite childhood tale, The True History of the Mud Man, and current residence of his strange, elderly spinster daughters: twins, Persephone and Seraphina, and their younger half-sister, Juniper.

When Edie is commissioned to write a new introduction to the old book, she's given access to the castle, the sisters, and the secrets of their past. What she finds out about her mother, the Blythe family, and the terrible, stormy night that started Juniper's descent into madness so many years ago changes all of their lives forever.

With its layered story lines, book and letter excerpts, multiple time periods, spooky castles, and unusual characters, The Distant Hours is the perfect Gothic novel. I enjoyed trying to piece together the mysteries, and devoured the book in just four days. If you love books like Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Rebecca, or The Thirteenth Tale you'll love The Distant Hours. I give it my highest recommendation.

Ever since I heard Kate Morton was working on a new novel, I have eagerly been awaiting its release. Having read her two previous novels The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden, I knew I was in for a treat. Ms. Morton knows how to write a mystery that keeps the reader guessing. This book will not disappoint those who fell in love with the author's writing in her first two books.

The center of the mystery in The Distant Hours is an old and remote castle called Milderhurst where three elderly sisters reside. The sisters, two of which are twins, and the castle itself are the source of much speculation since their father was the author of a literary classic entitled The True History of the Mud Man. Raymond Blythe was a mysterious author of which not much was known about, except that he married twice lost his first wife in a horrible fire and lived the life of a recluse in his later years.

In 1941 young Juniper Blythe was engaged to marry a young man named Thomas Cavill. He was expected to arrive on a stormy night. The dinner was ready, the dishes were set and Juniper was wearing her best outfit in an attempt to convince her overbearing older sister, Percy to accept the engagement. The problem is Thomas never arrived and decades later the elderly Juniper still roams the castle as if it Thomas is expected at any moment.

When editor Edie Burchill visits the author's home, she carries her own mystery. Her mother once lived in the old castle during World War II as an evacuee. Before Edie unexpectedly finds herself at the castle's door, her mother is presented with a letter from the youngest Blythe sister, Juniper, which causes Meredith Burchill a very emotional reaction. Edie feels compelled to visit the castle and the sisters in order to discover her own mother's connection to the home of the famous author.Meredith's connection to the Blythe sisters really takes a backseat to a very intriguing mystery surrounding Juniper.

The novel is a bit longer than Morton's previous novels, but I never felt the novel dragged on like some lengthy novels do. As I got deeper and deeper into the novel, the Thomas Cavill mystery became more and more fascinating. Do not try and guess his fate. I thought I had it figured out early in the novel, but I was dead wrong. Kate Morton is known for her shocking endings. While this ending was not as shocking as The House at Riverton, I must confess I never saw it coming. I applaud the author for such a creative and unexpected ending. If you have read Morton's books, you must read The Distant Hours. If you have never read a novel by this author, I recommend starting with The House at Riverton and then proceeding with The Forgotten Garden. The novels this author writes are truly a delight!

This is the first book I've read by Kate Morton. What a delicious find! Right from the beginning of this wonderful novel, I was completely captivated. I loved the writing, the characters, the storyline, everything about it! I devoured it in two evenings, made even better by the fact that the weather cooperated nicely with rains and wind that mimicked the storms surrounding the castle! (Just the cherry on the sundae). No matter where I'd read it, however, and no matter the circumstances, I would have remained removed from my surroundings as I was fully immersed in the events as they unfolded throughout this book.

I don't want to utter one word of spoiler for another reader, so suffice it to say that this book far exceeded my expectations and while I couldn't wait to read through to the end, it was a bittersweet finale as I closed the book on a wonderful saga.

The Distant Hours is Australian author, Kate Morton's third novel. The novel plays out over two time periods: the early 1940s and 50 years later. The story begins when Meredith Burchill receives a letter that has been delayed by 50 years. The letter is from one of the Blythe sisters of Milderhurst Castle in Kent, to where Meredith was evacuated from London during the war. Her daughter Edith watches her reaction and is inwardly sceptical when her mother dismisses the letter as unimportant. Sometime later, Edith's publishing job takes her near Milderhurst Castle, where she is drawn to know more about the place her mother stayed, the place that was also home to the famous author, Raymond Blythe. She meets the elderly sisters Blythe: the twins, Persephone (Percy) and Seraphina (Saffy) and the much younger (and mad) Juniper (June), during a tour of the Castle. Whilst there, she hears something of the events of 50 years previous that have left Juniper stuck on October 29th, 1941. Juniper still waits for the expected fiancé who never arrived. This book is filled with wonderful prose ("And then had come the rain, great sobbing drops that brought an immediate sheen to the world." and "The room bore an unmistakeable signature of stillness"). The characters develop well: Morton binds the sisters in an intricate tangle of love and duty and resentment. The plot is involved and interesting enough to keep the reader turning pages. By about a third of the way through I was convinced I had figured out who dunnit, as I think many readers will be. It was such a lovely read, though, that I kept going and was duly surprised by the twist at the end. The epilogue was a superb touch. A very enjoyable read.

In general, I think my favorites books tend to be from authors who only produce a single novel, maybe two. I guess they are the type of single stories an author almost feels the need to get out. The bad part is it means I don't get to anticipate another novel from a favorite author too much. Kate Morton is an exception...I just love her haunting stories. I consider them literary mysteries although the word gothic is bantered about more.

The Distant Hours is told in two time periods, the pretty modern-day journey of Edie to uncover the past and the WWII-era residents of Milderhurst Castle. Edie learns her mother was evacuated from London to the castle as a girl during the war and discovers the castle was also the place where a favorite childhood read was penned. The book explores the mystery of the book as well as the disappearance of a young man engaged to one of the sisters living in the castle. It is heavily influenced by concepts of family...both those that are arguably too tight and those where mothers and daughters feel at a loss to understand one another.

It probably isn't my favorite Morton book (The Forgotten Garden would win), but I still fell into and it is still a solid 4 star read. The characters have complex histories and emotions and their relationships are much more real than perfect. It's a long book but I devoured it. I often want to savor a good read and not let it end, but I really wanted to know the book's secrets. I'll definitely re-read it eventually....I think it would be interesting to go back to the start while knowing the secrets.

Secrets of the past whisper through "The Distant Hours" creating a tale full of mystery.

This gothic tale begins in 1992 with a letter from the past coming to Meredith from 50 years before, creating many questions and unexplained emotions for her daughter, Edith. Come on this journey as it weaves among the decades to uncover all the secrets that have been hidden since the evacuation days of WWII. Discover how the Sisters Blythe lives all began and the twists and turns that spiraled through the years as they spent their days at Milderhurst Castle. Listen to the secrets that reveal themselves bit by bit as Edie unravels the mysteries that lie inside those stone-cold walls. Can you hear the whispers? Can you feel the lost loves and unspoken longings?

I have to admit this book moved very slowly for me. I enjoyed reading the descriptions and imagining in my mind's eye the gothic settings around the castle, but the story itself just didn't take off at the beginning like I would have liked. About midway through, it did pick up, so then it was better.

Kate Morton is a new author to me, so I would like to read some more of her work. I have read about her other novel, " The Forgotten Garden" and I would very much like to see what it is like.

I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a gothic tale that is full of history, mystery, and lost loves.

This book was provided to me through Goodreads first reads and this is my honest review.

This is the second of Kate Morton's book that I have read, the first being THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN. Ms. Morton definitely has a lyrical way of writing and, as an author myself, I have often stopped in the middle of a sentence she has written, just to re-read it several times. This woman is definitely gifted and knows exactly how to create a good book.

I was amazed to see that she is Australian as her books definitely have a wonderful British flavor, which is what made me read them in the first place (I am English).

No need to give you a summary of the plot. If you like stories that span many years, have wonderful descriptive passages, and culminate in a satisfying ending - this is the book and the author for you. For those who complain that the book "lags", I would suspect they may have an attention span problem. The detail given these books is amazingly well done and Ms. Morton is to be complimented. She is turning into one of my favorite authors and I highly recommend the above-mentioned twop books. THE HOUSE AT RIVERTON is next on my list!

Valerie Byron author of NO ORDINARY WOMAN

I have read three other Kate Mirton books and loved them. The Secret Keeper, the Forgotten Garden and the house at Riverton. All were books you couldn't put down. But this book I just couldn't get into. Got half way through and gave up. Luckily got it from the library. I would have more dissapointed had I purchased it.

I understand The author is coming out with a new book in spring. I sure hope it's of the quality of the three I mentioned. She can be a very talented writer but felt she missed the boat on this one.

Moving between 1941 and the early 1990s, Morton connects mother, daughter and mystery in the long unraveling of a family tragedy. Much of the critical action takes place at Milderhurst Castle during World War II, where three sisters live with a father made famous by his terrifying novel, The True History of the Mud Man. A truly gothic tale, Raymond Blythe's seminal work has earned him popular cache, even as the years pass and he retires to a reclusive life in the tower of his castle. The family history has been marred by premature, violent death, bodies falling from the tower or burned beyond recognition as the family library is engulfed in flames. The Blythe sisters, Persephone, Seraphina and Juniper, carry on the legacy bequeathed them, bound together by Juniper's lost lover, an event that alters her life.

During the years of the blitz in London, many mothers opt to send their children to the country to be temporarily sheltered by volunteer families. Thus does an impressionable Meredith arrive in the village, carried home to Milderhurst Castle by the exotic Juniper. Meredith flourishes in her new environment, exposed to art and literature, her world expanded by the sisters in their darkly romantic castle, Juniper in particular. Fifty years later, Edie Burchill, Meredith's daughter, returns to the castle, hoping to uncover a past her mother has never talked about. Soon past and present collide as Edie tenaciously investigates the wartime events, unearthing as well a vault of family secrets. Now elderly and frail, the sisters inhabit a crumbling castle, Percy and Saffy attending a more fragile Juniper.

Morton makes use of letters, diaries and Raymond Blythe's novel to draw her readers into a labyrinthine world of long-buried sins, the voices of the dead longing for release: "Evil on itself shall back recall (Milton)." The gothic tale of Blythe's Mud Man yields an atmosphere both moody and moldy, a filled-in moat, a little girl starring from the tower room on a stormy night. On a lighter note, Edie's exertions are on her mother's behalf, the daughter seeking to restore the bond that seems to have disappeared. Even with the fresh perspective of youth, Edie is seduced by the time-worn Milderhurst Castle and the Blythe sisters as Meredith was fifty years before. Although some rigorous editing would not be remiss, gradually everyone's stories are exposed to the light of day, long-hidden secrets revealed, a family held captive by a tale of horror, their darkest fears based on an awful truth. Luan Gaines/2010.

Edie Burchill's life becomes entwined in the lives of three elderly sisters at a country castle called Milderhurst when her mother receives a lost letter from one of the sisters. Her mother's letter from one of the sisters sends Edie on a journey wherein she discovers the secrets from her own mother's past but also the secrets that are buried at the ancient castle.

Edie works at a small publishing company in London and she loves a book called "The Secret History of the Mud Man" which she read when she was a little girl. The sisters at Milderhurst Castle are the children of the author of "The Secrets of the Mudman".

"The Distant Hours" hauntingly tells the story of Edie's mother and the intriguing and sad story of the inhabitants of Milderhurst. The story moves between the late 1930's to 1940's during World War II and the 1990's when Edie visits the sisters at Milderhurst Castle.

"The Distant Hours" leads the reader from present day back to the past as the author weaves a suspenseful and compelling mystery of the past and the present. Very compelling reading and a good mystery.

Would you listen to The Distant Hours again? Why?

Yes, I fell in love with the way Kate Morton tells a story. I will definitely listen to this one again, and will most likely get her other books too!

What other book might you compare The Distant Hours to and why?

Wuthering Heights because both authors are great at the atmosphere in a tale. Superb!

Have you listened to any of Caroline Lee’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Not sure, but I did love her voice and the inflections she gives to each character. Wonderful!

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

If it wasn't so long I would have stayed up all night to get to the end

If this had been my first Kate Morton novel, I'm not sure I'd come back for more. But since it's my third, I'll stick with her because I simply adored "The House at Riverton" and "The Forgotten Garden". I didn't like this one as well as those, although it's a good, solid book. I found there to be so many threads I had a hard time keeping track of the tapestry. It mostly ties up neatly at the end and the omniscient reader gets the whole story, while the participants see only parts. I was a little bugged that Edie's brother, Daniel, wasn't a little more explained when he kept being mentioned, but most of the loose ends were explained. I liked the way writing and words were at the heart of the novel and how their impact was different on each character. Writing was a major theme of the book and the characters were interesting and compelling, but it just wasn't as totally awesome as the other novels.

In her third and latest novel, The Distant Hours, Kate Morton delivers an unforgettable tale that takes us to a great home in England around the time of World War II.

It opens with the delivery of a long lost letter which drives young Edie Burchill to investigate Milderhurst Castle, a once grand estate in England, where her mother had once been billeted as a thirteen-year-old girl during World War II. Edie is drawn to Milderhurst and its owners, the three Blythe sisters. The elder Blythe sisters are twins and have spent most of their lives protecting their youngest sister Juniper who hasn't been the same since a fateful night in 1941. As Edie unravels the mystery of her mother's stay at Milderhurst, she uncovers the truth behind the mysterious tragedies that have haunted the Blythe family for decades.

The Distant Hours is an engrossing read full of family secrets and betrayal- equal parts mystery and historical fiction.

I love all of Kate Morton's books. Morton has such a wonderful command of the English language that her books are a joy to read. She is a great story teller and the reader is immersed in the world that she creates. The Distant Hours took the reader right into the middle of the Sisters' world and their secrets. The story in The Distant Hours is a good one and wonderfully told with many twists and turns to keep you guessing until the very end. The common complaint seems to be that the novel bogs down during the first part. I felt that, too, when I was reading it...but pushed past it to be well rewarded as the story picked up and moved along for the rest of the book. Looking back at the part I felt was slow, I think all of the information there was necessary to establish the characters of the sisters and to really understand the later developments in the story. This book has rich characters that aren't easily forgotten. I found myself thinking about this book long after I had finished it. A good read!

I enjoyed the first chapter which seemed to indicate layered characters and an enjoyable mystery. Before the half way point, I returned to the store to see if others began finding it tedious. Clearly it wasn't just me. I did make it to the end but so much of it didn't make sense even with going back over a few characters to see if I missed some important details. I have enjoyed other books of Kate Morton and she can certainly write well but this one isn't a book I'd recommend to friends or family.

OH!MY!WORD! I was immediately drawn into the story. The characters are well developed. The twists and turns kept me turning the pages. This book is a must read!

*I borrowed a copy of this book from my local library. All views expressed are my honest opinion.*

While I enjoy Kate Morton's books, this one was not my favorite--too many time jumps, strange segues, weird characters, etc. I now Kate favors writing stories that take place at the turn of the early 20th century and the World Wars, this one did not leave me as satisfied as The Lake House, The Secret Keeper or The House at Riverton.

A letter written in 1941 finally reaches its destination in 1992. Its arrival throws the recipient, Meredith Burchill into tears. Meredith's daughter Edie embarks on a journey that leads her to the dark and decaying, perfectly gloomy, Milderhurst Castle in Kent where her mother was evacuated during the war.

In The Distant Hours, a story spanning two generations and fifty years, Kate Morton is at her best. She gently takes us from 1992 London to 1941 Kent. We meet the three elderly, eccentric Blythe sisters, and then Morton takes us back to 1941 where see them at Milderhurst as they were with their lives yet to be lived. We learn that Meredith was evacuated to the Milderhurst Castle as a young teen during the war and that the dark secrets she encountered there are still able to affect lives today.

As more mysteries are uncovered, Edie is further bewildered when she learns that the author of her favorite childhood book, The True History of the Mud Man, was written by Raymond Blythe, the father of the three sisters. There are so many questions to be answered and so many puzzles to be put together. There were so many lives torn apart. What happened at Milderhurst in the days of WW II, when children were evacuated to the countryside, when blackouts happened nightly and regular bombings rumbled building and took lives?

Kate Morton has again written a richly layered, well told saga of families and secrets. I love Morton's books and have to say that I think The Distant Hours is my new favorite. Bake up a batch of scones and brew a pot of Earl Grey and enjoy this haunting story.

If I gave stars, this one would get 4 1/2 out of 5.

Kate Morton, a native Australian, holds degrees in dramatic art and English literature and is currently a doctoral candidate at the University of Queensland. She lives with her family in Brisbane, Australia.

Source: I received this in e-galley form from the publisher at my request and in no way did this affect my review.

Even though Katie Morton is a skilled writer, this book was a bust. After slogging through a vaguely unpleasant tale of endless deceits, I arrived at the ending - a very disappointing one. I would not recommend this book to any of my reading buddies.

I can't decide if I'm pleased with or disappointed in this book, which is rough because I love Kate Morton. It's a story about a woman (about my age) who discovers Milderhurst Castle and the secrets within it, along with its ties to her own family. The story was great and I enjoyed reading it but I really didn't like the ending, which is probably why I don't know how I feel about this book.

I liked the way the story moved forward (mostly fluidly) even though it was told from both the 1940's and currently. I also liked the characters. Despite her ongoing descriptions of all things physical and tendency to go a little long in places, I felt that some of the characters could have used a little more development (Saffy, in particular).

As usual Kate Morton has done it again. Her characters interweave and mesmerize. This mother daughter unraveling of the past is captivating and heart warming. As usual the castle in this story is as much of a main character as the people. The historical era of the story takes you back in time and places you in the moment. As usual the relationships in the story are more complex than they seem and I thoroughly enjoyed unwrapping the plot layer by layer, clue by clue. There continues to be that eerie literary focus, haunting theme in this book as well. I only have one Kate Morton book left I haven't read, hopefully another will come out before I finish it!

I finished THE DISTANT HOURS a couple of weeks ago and have been trying to assemble my thoughts on this book in order to write a review. I enjoyed Kate Morton's first two books, THE HOUSE AT RIVERTON and THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN, so I had been looking forward to her latest offering with great anticipation. Her previous books had illustrated Ms. Morton's understanding of the tender intricacies of love and family relationships and her proficiency with vivid imagery. I reveled in her unique ability to compose a narrative so compelling it was capable of transporting me to another time and place.

The premise of DISTANT HOURS was promising, a fifty year old letter delivered to an unsuspecting recipient, three strange sisters residing in a decrepit old castle, the genesis of a children's fairy tale, an unusual bequest, unrequited love, and a daughter's attempt to uncover the secret memories and previously unknown details of her mothers past. There is a lot of story here, perhaps too much. At 555 pages the book could have benefited from some astute and well advised editing.

The novel utilizes multiple narrators to tell its story and moves between WWII and 1993. The writing is atmospheric and many of the passages peppered here and there throughout the novel are positively poetic. For all of those positive aspects, the multiple storyline never fulfills its early promise and ends up resembling a big beautiful red balloon that suddenly develops a slow leak. It floats, it glides and ultimately it falls to earth....unable to maintain its buoyancy.

Perhaps this is one of those instances where the reader's expectations are so high, based upon previous experiences with the author's offerings, that those expectations are impossible to fulfill. I wanted this book to be a five, I was expecting a five, but I barely got a three.

I just finished The Distant Hours. (literally....stayed up well into the early morning hours to finish it) I agree with other reviewers who say that this book could have easily been shortened. The plot did drag on a bit, and in the end, I found that I did not care as much about the characters as I did in her previous two novels. Morton has a gift for creating memorable characters and providing elegant descriptions, but this particular story could have benefited from deeper development of some of the secondary characters (Meredith, Thomas, and Juniper, in particular). This was a good story, and there was no way I was going to abandon it once I started reading, but it could have been better.

That being said, I will buy every single novel Kate Morton writes. I simply think she is one of the best writers out there. While The Distant Hours didn't affect me emotionally in the same way The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden did, it is still a good novel, one that I'm glad I took the time to read.

If you love mysteries and castles, you will love this book. Kate Morton is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. I love her writing style and the Gothic mysteries she creates. These books have taken me back to my Nancy Drew days. Some mystery novels can be very predictable, but this was the opposite. It surprised me at every turn, and just when I thought I had it figured out, I didn't. Nothing was ever what it seemed. This made the book very enjoyable.

The characters in this story are very eccentric. Edie was the most normal relatable character. I felt like she was someone I could have been friends with. Her passion is books. That passion mixed with a little family history takes her on a wild journey that leads her to the Blythe sisters. As she uncovers the sisters' story and her mother's history, she discovers deeply buried secrets that will shock you. The twins are very interesting. They were truly like two halves of a whole. Although twins, they shared opposite character traits. Juniper was mentally ill and was never given proper treatment because her sisters would not let her leave the castle. They didn't want her taken away from them. They also suffered the consequences...

The story is captivating from the first page. I couldn't get enough of the story and couldn't put the book down. I highly recommend The Distant Hours and give it five stars.

Loved it! All of it: the gothic atmosphere, the castle setting, the WWII time frame as well as the early 90's time frame, the mystery of the mud man and the unexplained disappearance of Juniper's fiancé, Thomas Cavill. The Distant Hours sucked me in and never let me go.

The characters were so real to me, from the deliciously creepy Blythe sisters to Edie and her mom, Meredith. I could just about picture every move they made. The sense of place was very well done also. I love the way Morton revealed things slowly while filling in the backstory, keeping up my interest non-stop. The ending with it's twists and revelations had me riveted to the page. I just couldn't put it down. 5*

Kate Morton is also the author of The House of Riverton and The Secret Garden, both of which I really enjoyed.

I am absolutely amazed by Kate Morton's attention to detail and her writing style of basing a storyline off of a historic piece of writing -and the creativity it takes to write both! The Distant Hours was my second Kate Morton book, and while The Forgotten Garden is still ky favorite of the two, The Distant Hours was still a completely engrossing tale stretching through decades of compelling characters, with twists and turns all along the way. From the English countryside in the early 1900s, through war-torn London and the aftermath of the war, all the way into the 1990s, Kate's tale of sisterhood, mental illness, a love of literature and the shadows of the past is one I would definitely recommend!

After reading other novels by Kate Morton, I found this one disappointing. I kept reading to get to the end because her other novels had such a surprising twist at the end that I never saw coming. I often wanted to stop reading this because it drug out so slowly but I just knew I would be happy at the end. I was not and felt like I had wasted so much time.

I received an advance copy of this book from the publisher.

I loved Kate Morton's book THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN so I was very excited when I got a galley of her newest book, THE DISTANT HOURS. When a letter from 1941 finally arrives at its destination fifty years later, it has powerful repercussions for Edie Burchill, a young publisher in London. Edie's mother opens the much-belated letter and is powerfully affected by it. She reveals to Edie that she had been evacuated to a castle called Milderhurst in the countryside during the war. Edie is very surprised to learn of this previously hidden episode in her mother's life. She is even more surprised to learn that Milderhurst was the residence of the author of Raymond Blythe, the author of one her favorite books, THE TRUE HISTORY OF THE MUD MAN. This book is a national treasure and no one has ever cracked the mystery of the true inspiration behind the story. When Edie is brought to Milderhurst by chance, she can't resist learning more about the place her mother had been exiled to and, in so doing, becomes drawn into the lives of the three elderly Blythe sisters that reside there still and the mysteries surrounding them.

This is a very difficult book to describe. There is so much going on! It is a bit of a chunkster at 670 pages but the story flew by as I could not put it down. The story moves back and forth between the present of 1992 to the war years. We see the events unfolding through multiple perspectives as we try to learn the truth about the hidden secrets of the Blythe sisters and the origins of the famous MUD MAN story. There is also the side story of Edie trying to understand her mother, Meredith, by delving into her past. The book reveals a great deal about the often complicated relationships between parents and children and also between siblings. The book offers a literary mystery and reminded me a great deal of AS Byatt's POSSESSION and Diane Setterfield's THE THIRTEENTH TALE. All of the characters are interesting and the secrets and mysteries keep you guessing until the end.

I could not put this book down. I loved it even more than THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN. It has many of the elements of my favorite books--mystery, books, family drama and secrets, madness, passion, castles, romance and even some wartime drama. Although I think the ending was successful, it felt a little abrupt to me. I wish Morton hadn't hurried things up so much. However, it was a thoroughly entertaining read overall.

BOTTOM LINE: HIGHLY recommended. One of my favorites this year. Fans of AS Byatt and Diane Setterfield and even Charlotte Bronte will find much to enjoy here. This makes a great winter read.

Morton's books have a definite plot structure - family secrets that are slowly unveiled through interwoven stories from multiple points of view of the past and present - but it works for her!

Edie Burchill is an only child; she loves her parents but isn't particularly close to them even though she longs to know more about them as individuals. When her mother receives a letter that was caught up in the postal service for fifty years, Edie gets a glimpse of a side of her mother that she has never seen before and is eager to learn more.

The letter, combined with some serendipitous events, leads Edie on a path to discover the events during World War II that caused her mother to be evacuated to a country estate under the care of the eccentric Blythe sisters, the true story behind the classic children's novel The Mud Man, and the dark secrets that they Blythe family continues to hide a half century and more after their occurrence.

Morton has a wonderful way with words, she paints such a vivid picture of the characters and surroundings that I am instantly transported into her world. She is descriptive without be clinical or flowery - and I think that is a hard balance to strike. However, her plots are wonderfully circuitous but fairly easy to figure out; I read for the journey of getting to the end and not for the surprise revelation that is waiting. Even so, there are some minor twists and turns that add to the enjoyment of reading even if they don't spur you on to the next.

If you are a fan of Morton - as I am - then this book will not be a let down! If you are new to Morton, any of her books are a wonderful introduction to her body of work that is small as of yet but highly enjoyable....just don't read them all back-to-back!

As with all of Ms. Morton's books that I've read so far, this was layer upon layer of complex and beautiful stories. Every character was fleshed out, well rounded - as full and deep and contradictory as real people always are. The mysteries kept you guessing, kept you engaged and desperate to know. The scenery was described in such rich detail that you felt as if you were there, and the deeper themes give you much to think about long after you've finished. This was a fantastic read, and I highly recommend it.

Edie is an editor at a small publisher. Edie's mother, Meredith, was evacuated from her family in London as a child during WWII to stay with a family in a rural area, the castle Milderhurst. One day, a long lost letter is found and delivered from Milderhurst to Meredith and it makes her cry. Edie takes it upon herself to dig back in time to discover her mother's past and to learn about the girl her mother used to be. In the process, Edie finds out much more than just her mother's past. She also discovers the history of the Blythe family and the castle Milderhurst.

I am not a fan of stories that jump back and forth through time and back and forth from different perspectives. It takes a while for me to adjust after jumps and there are quite a lot of jumps. The chapters are numbered in a particular way that might provide clues to the reader, but I didn't even notice the peculiar numbering until the middle of the book.

The author made the castle Milderhurst magical in a beautiful way. It wasn't paranormal or necessarily haunted by a ghost or a wizard/witch/vampire/etc. For one, it was simply beautiful in the way a young girl innocently dreams it to be. For others, the castle is confining with dark secrets.

I was struck by how deeply the author portrayed the complicated family relationships both in Edie's family and Blythe family. I could feel the tension in the air when they had disagreements and I felt like I knew them.

The end of the book just flew by for me. This isn't a light and fluffy book. It's deep and a bit dark. It has its share of sadness as well as happiness. After I read a quick happy book, I look forward to reading Kate Morton's other books.

This is the first book I have read from this author. The beginning chapters were very boring and several times I was tempted to put it down for good. However, I pushed myself to continue. In the middle it caught my attention and could not put it down. However, the end was disappointing. Not sure what I was expecting, but the ending was too sad. Also, since it is my first book from this author, I am not sure if this is the way she typically writes. There are some mysteries and unanswered questions, but the author lays them out for you so you know what happens - just not why. In my opinion, by writing like this, there was no built up suspense for me. I have not completely given up on this author. I am planning to read The Forgotten Garden next.

The first book I ever ready by Kate Morton was The Forgotten Garden. It sucked me in and I finished it in 2 days. I immediately order her other books and chose The Distant Hours to read next. While it took me longer to read (I was busy doing other things), I loved it just as much. Kate Morton has a way of weaving her stories around a great mystery and intertwining the past and present. You can't help but love the Blythe Sisters and their life and Milderhurst Castle and Edie who unravels the mysteries from the past. Just when you think you have everything figured out the ending surprises you!

It actually took almost a month for me to finish this book. That is a VERY long time for me .. but it wasn't because I didn't love it. Other review commitments with firm dates kept dodging in; it's a pretty big book; and .. well, it's the type of book you don't rush through.

It's not a complicated read. It's a book that you want to savor. I found myself thinking once, "It's like dipping your finger into a chocolate fondue made of words."

Even though I kept getting sidetracked, I kept this on my living room table (the home of THE book I most want to read at the time), and every time I opened it, it was like meeting an old friend. As I slipped right back into the river of it's softly flowing pages, it was as though I'd never left. There's a classic writing style at play here (think Jane Eyre) that makes you feel almost as though you should be reading a great historical fiction novel, even though it's in a contemporary setting.

It begins and ends with The Mud Man.

Raymond Blythe is the tragically deceased owner of Milderhurst Castle, He was also the author of The Mud Man, a favored children's story. We start the novel with an excerpt.

Edie is the main protagonist, very literary, who works for an indie publisher. Her love of books began with The Mud Man.

Edie's mother, Meredith, receives a letter from a bag of mail that a postal worker failed to deliver 50 years ago. Her reaction to the letter, even though she attempts to cover it up, isn't lost on her daughter. When Edie finds out that her mother was one of the English children sent to live in the countryside with strangers at the beginning of the war, she resolves to find out more.

Enter Milderhurst castle, where the three Sisters Blythe still reside.

Persephone (Percy): There was something fundamentally broken at the heart of Percy Blythe, something queer and defective and utterly unlikable. That she should contemplate, even for a second, the ease with which she might deprive her sister, her infuriating, beloved twin, of happiness.

Seraphina (Saffy) and her dreams: The wireless would be her only companion, and she'd pause in her typing throughout the day to listen to the weather reports, leaving briefly the world she was creating on the page to gaze through the window at the clear, smokeless London sky.

And poor, doomed Juniper, the youngest: Away from the castle, away from the world of Raymond Blythe, the terrible things he'd told her, his seeping guilt and sadness, she was free. There'd been none of her visitors in London, there'd been no lost time. And although her great fear had followed her, the fear that she was capable of harming others, it was different here.

There's mystery, and madness. Suicides, murder and secrets. There are surprises, both good and bad, and betrayals, and seeming-betrayals. There are lost loves, and graspingly mad possession. When you think you have a mystery figured out, it turns on you. When you say to yourself, "Ah! NOW I have it!", you find out that you don't. And you won't ... almost to the very end.

This book was so wonderfully-written that I don't have the words or the space to do it justice. Buy it and read it.

QUOTES:

I was sunk then by the sense that I knew everything and nothing of the person sitting next to me. The woman in whose body I had grown and whose house I'd been raised was in some vital ways a stranger to me; I'd gone thirty years without ascribing her any more dimension than the paper dollies I'd played with as a girl, with the pasted-on smiles and the folding tab dresses.

Juniper understood why people referred to it as a fall. The brilliant, swooping sensation, the diving imprudence, the complete loss of will. It had been just like that for her, but it had also been much more. After a lifetime spent shrinking away from physical contact, Junper had finally connected.

Percy's chest ached. She steeled herself against the pull of sentiment. She didn't want to remember the girl her twin had been, back before Daddy broke her, when she'd had talent and dreams and every chance of fulfilling them.

Once during adolescence I read THE WANDERER by Alain-Fournier. Not since then have I read a novel as subtly captivating as THE DISTANT HOURS. In both, an adult narrator tells the story of a numinous era in their life when a gateway in life is crossed, a threshold that fundamentally transforms them. I found this novel very entrancing in description and intricate plot detail, with the mysterious ruined castle, the sisters laden with deep secrets, and throughout the brooding darkness of walls that whisper of a tragic past that gave birth to the legend of a "mud man" who appears at lofty windows in the night.

Perhaps the highest compliment I can give this work is that I lost track of time whenever I sat down to read it.

I will eagerly seek out this author's other works.

So, I have raved to anyone and everyone about how much I loved Kate Morton's The House at Riverton. Seriously, that was my favorite book for 2009 and one of my favorite books ever. I also loved The Forgotten Garden, though I didn't rave about that one quite as much as I raved about The House at Riverton. However, The Distant Hours deserves the most praise out of all three books. Why? Well, because it takes what's amazing about The House at Riverton (the moodiness, the atmosphere) and what's tremendous about The Forgotten Garden (the airiness, the enchantment) and puts it together into one fantastic novel.

I loved every single word of The Distant Hours. Yes, the book is long as hell, but every single page was worth it. Book lover that I am, I loved the character of Edie and could completely understand why she would be so enchanted with Milderhurst Castle (as I am also a Gothic Literature Lover or GLL as I like to call it) and her fascination with the written word was something that I could relate to. I was so connected to everything in this book. MILD SPOILER: LIKE VERY MILD: During one part, Edie is talking to Saffy and Saffy is concerned that Percy will catch her doing just that, and I felt just as worried as Edie that Percy would catch the two conversing and Saffy wouldn't be able to tell her story. I just didn't want them to be interrupted. END OF EXTREMELY MILD SPOILER.

I was so enchanted with The Distant Hours. One of my favorite things about it was the whole history of The Mud Man. It came to the point where I really wished that book existed because it just sounded so utterly fascinating and captivating. (And since we're being truthful, if J.K. Rowling had written The Distant Hours, The Mud Man would be a published best-selling novella by now. So, maybe it's foolish, but I want The Mud Man published.) The same thing happened in The Forgotten Garden. I found Eliza's fairytales enchanting and just as enjoyable (if not more) than the overall story.

There were a lot of twists and turns in The Distant Hours. And no I'm not going to mention not even one of them. However, I will say that I discovered one of the twists before it had been revealed, but there were many more were that came from (but not in that annoying "mystery writer" type of way. Each of these twists seemed necessary and weren't necessarily red-herrings). Every time I thought that I had something figured out, Morton would throw a curveball at it and everything would unravel again (again, not in the annoying mystery writer way).

So, I definitely, whole-heartedly, recommend The Distant Hours. It was an amazing, enchanting, captivating read that just flew by since you're desperate to figure what really went on. Read it if you want a read with any of these things. Also, The Distant Hours is best read in the evening in the middle of a storm (rainstorm, snowstorm, sandstorm, it doesn't really matter), just to feel the full effect. I read some of it yesterday in the middle of a snowstorm, at night, and ended up creeping myself out just a little. Anyway, read The Distant Hours. It was amazing and Kate Morton is an amazing writer.

This is the first book by Kate Morton that I've had the pleasure of reading, and I wasn't disappointed. A thick literary mystery with layers of intrigue and clues to be discovered.

Edie Burchill, a present day publisher, stumbles across a decades old mystery surrounding the decrepit and ancient Milderhurst Castle in the English countryside. Little does she know that the aged Blythe sisters who live there, twins Percey and Saffy, and their younger sister Juniper, are each hiding secrets from themselves and the village. When Edie discovers that her own mother spent some time at Milderhurst during the evacuation of children from London in World War II, she's bound by a sense of duty as well as her own curiosity to visit Milderhurst and learn more about the women who live there, and their father who wrote a famous children's story which Edie herself once adored.

The Distant Hours is a good mystery, page after page pulls you in, and Morton deftly layers plot on plot, tying all the strings together at the end. There's more to the scene than just Milderhurst and the women who live there. There's the mystery of the two wives of their father, and how they each died. What happened to the man who was supposed to visit Juniper? Why won't Edie's mother talk about her time at the castle? Morton is a master at the multi-plot book. She leaves no loose ends.

At times the plot lines did become predictable and plodding, however I still found myself pushing onward enjoying the heft and length of the book in hand. A satisfactory read, enjoyable; charmingly odd, like the Blythe sisters and their secrets.

I'm a fan of Kate Morton's work so I was happy to settle down and read The Distant Hours. At 670 pages, it isn't a book you can whizz through, nor is it an easy read. But if you're looking for an intriguing read with more threads than a spider's web, then you should definitely check it out.

This is the story of Milderhurst Castle. It begins with a long lost letter, which results in Edie Burchill taking a trip from London to Kent in search of the grand old castle, and the three Blythe sisters that live within it. Edie is linked to the castle because her mother lived there when she was evacuated during World War II - and it was from here that the mysterious letter came.

Soon after her arrival in Milderhurst village, Edie finds herself fascinated by the story of the three sisters and the decaying castle. This fascination only increases when she starts to find out more about them and their lives - particularly the fact that none of them ever married, and that the two older sisters spent most of their lives looking after their younger sister, due to her taking a funny turn when her fiancé jilted her in 1941.

Edie's own mother's past is wrapped up in the castle, and as she sets about unravelling it, she discovers that there are more secrets than she could have ever imagined hidden within the old stones. Stories of love, loss, family, friendship... and some much more sinister tales, too.

Kate Morton has turned out another fabulous book here. With books this long, there's a danger that it won't hold the reader's interest, or that there's superfluous information. This is definitely not the case with The Distant Hours. It's telling the story of a castle and its inhabitants across the span of many, many years and several generations of family. There's a lot to tell and it's all relevant to the plot. I, for one, was drawn in very quickly to the narrative, and found myself, just as Edie was, to find out more and more about the happenings at Milderhurst Castle. Morton has an enviable knack of telling a story in such a way that she gives you titbits of information that make you desperate to find out the full story. This happens throughout, giving you lots to think and wonder about, not least how it will all tie together at the end of the novel. But tie together it does, with a satisfactory if not tragic ending.

I really enjoyed The Distant Hours and think Kate Morton's imagination and style of storytelling is incredible. I'll be looking forward to more of her books.

It took me a long time to get into this book, but I persevered because I loved Kate Morton's book The Lake House so much. When it finally picked up more than half way through, I had difficulty putting it down. This author is incredibly gifted at unveiling mysteries layer upon layer. And she certainly did an excellent job of that in this book, right up to the end, when I thought all the mysteries were revealed. Outstanding!

Kate Morton is one of my favorite authors, so I was thrilled when my husband bought me a copy of The Distant Hours. It had all the elements I need in a good story--family mysteries, a beloved book and a castle--at the mention of those things, I was hooked. Upon finishing the book, I wasn't disappointed. While it didn't quite reach the standard that I feel The Forgotten Garden set, it was still an absorbing read.

Edie, the main character, was a bit dramatic at times, but it usually felt in keeping with her tendency to day dream and go off on flights of fancy. That characteristic quite endeared her to me actually. I love how her relationship with both of her parents evolved throughout the story, despite her belief that those relationships could go no deeper.

I don't mind long books at all, but I felt that plot dragged a bit in the beginning. That was really a minor detail though--just don't expect action from page one, it's really not that type of book.

I'm always fascinated with sisterly relationships, having grown up with brothers and not having many close girl friends. The relationship between the three Blythe sisters was touching and heartbreaking at the same time. I loved how the mystery surrounding the night Juniper's intended never arrived to meet them in their castle culminated at the end of the novel. A lot of times I can solve things before the end of a novel, but Morton really threw me for a loop on that one, which was great. While it seemed like their relationship was built on control and jealousy on twin Percy's part, it really ended up being about sacrifice and protection for Saffy and Juniper. Morton's characters really kept surprising me.

The one thing that was a bit off putting was the narration style. With Edie it is first person, but the sister's perspective is third person. It just took a bit of adjustment when I first started reading the book, but I know a few people who don't like those narration shifts, so it is worth mentioning.

This is one of those books that I can see myself reading again. I am wholeheartedly a Kate Morton fan and eagerly look forward to her next novel coming out.

Kate Morton's novels are always hard to put down. This one certainly has that effect but unfortunately I didn't find the story as convincing as those I'd read previously. The story centres around a famous novel written by a man whose life was apparently blighted by tragedy. The repercussions of his novel and the tragic events of his life and his legacy prove inescapable for his three daughters. The narrator is fascinated by the family and the castle in which they live because of her love of the old novel and the fact that her somewhat distant mother was a resident in the author's home for a time during WW 2.
This is a well finished novel and none of the twists and turns are left unresolved. I enjoyed it but I admit that I have enjoyed other Kate Morton books more!

Kate Morton has done it again! She is a brilliant storyteller, so adept at bringing her characters to life for the reader. I have never been disappointed by Kate, not ever, and this book is no exception!

I never "figured out" the story. I had my own theory about the Blythe sisters, and I was wrong. Just goes to prove that just when you think you have someone all figured out, they surprise you! This is a story of love, not just the romantic sort, but love of family and those bonds that tie us to each other. The end had me near tears, so moving was the imagery. I can't say enough about how wonderful, warm and inviting this book is. It's not always happy, not always sad, just like real life, it's lots of things and so worth the journey!

The story of Eddie's mother and the sisters Blythe was intriguing, mesmerizing. I delved into this magical tale, body and soul and never wanted to leave it. The descriptions were so vivid, I felt like I experienced it all for myself. After The Forgotten Garden, Kate Morton created a second masterpiece and this is it. If you want to immerse yourself in another world, in a bygone era, and completely lose yourself there, then this is it. This is the joy of reading at its best. Highly recommended!

One of the first things I noticed about this book was how beautifully written it is. The author has a lovely, intelligent way of expressing herself. Although I did not find it difficult to figure out, for the most part, what was coming next, I still enjoyed the telling of each part of it--except the end.

The ending pages of the story, where we knew what had happened but not exactly how it had happened, dragged for me. At times I felt it was excruciatingly long. This, however, did not dampen my overall enjoyment of reading this book. Although I would have liked a different outcome for some of the characters, it was satisfying enough for me to consider it well worth reading.

I enjoyed all of Kate Morton's books, especially The Forgotten Garden. This was my second favorite. I think she had a great idea, and it started out INCREDIBLE, but fizzled towards the end.

From the description, I was expecting that it would be my all-time favorite book. I was disappointed though, because I felt as though she could have done so much more with the mysterious parts of the story, especially the sounds in the walls. She left several loose ends that, once tied together, could have made the story unbelievable! It felt like she had the skeleton of a masterpiece, and she was just in a hurry to finish it.

I wish that he had made this book into a trilogy. Had she...it could truly have been epic. Such a disappointment.

This was my first read by Kate Morton. I had no idea what to expect except from all the wonderful reviews I have read from other bloggers on her books. I received an advance readers copy which was a whopping 672 pages long! Quite a chunkster for me! However, I was looking forward to reading it. I dug in with gusto. The story is very detailed and the characters are very complex. The story comes together rather slowly but it does a great job building suspense, at least it did for me. I'm not sure that if the story moved faster you would get the same effect. It is a very layered story.

I was very curious about Milderhurst and the sister's who lived in the castle. I was very curious about the letter that caused such a reaction for Edith's mother and how everything tied into the castle and the sisters. There are so many questions I had when reading the book. As more of the mystery is revealed, I found myself wondering how in the world it was all going to resolve itself. Ironically, I found the ending when the whole story finally comes together a bit rushed and I ended up reading it three times. I think at that point the suspense was killing me and I was reading it much too fast. Take your time with the ending. It is a very good one and you don't want to miss one bit of it's goodness. I will be reading Kate's other books as I think she is a wonderful storyteller. She is quite descriptive which left me with both beautiful and dark images of Milderhurst. This is a story of family, lost love, mystery and intrigue. I found myself wanting to both hurry through the story to find out the ending and wanting to savor every morsel of the story. I have never had a book do that before. I highly recommend this book.

Kate Morton's first two books were good, but with her third, The Distant Hours, she has achieved perfection. Beautiful lyrical writing, romances that will enthrall, and suspenseful story lines to keep the reader guessing are just some of the reasons this book is one I highly recommend.

Set in a run-down castle that has seen better days and shifting from 1941 to the 1990's, the story follows a pair of twin sisters and their younger half sister who are bound by circumstances to never leave their home. A young British girl, Meredith, is evacuated from London and stays with them during World War II and becomes very attached to the youngest sister. Fifty years later, Meredith receives a long-delayed letter which upsets her. Her daughter, Edie, cannot sit quietly by when her mother refuses to divulge the contents of the letter and finds herself at the castle seeking answers to her mother's past. What she discovers is so much more as a tale of mystery and terror, love and madness, slowly unravels. There's a madman in the tower, secret passages, and of course, a dark and stormy night at the climax. Be prepared to be totally captivated!

I've read Kate Morton's other books The House at Riverton and The Forgotten Garden so I was looking forward to The Distant Hours; while I liked it very much it fell a little bit short of the other two, both of which I loved.

The storytelling device is again the same, intertwining stories that are told from two time perspectives, 1992 and 1939 - 1941. It all begins with a letter that is delivered 50 years after it was posted.When Meredith Burchill receives the letter her daughter Edie is present and sees that the letter has deeply disturbed her mother.
Meredith refuses to talk about it, but eventually Edie learns that during the war her mother was evacuated from London to the countryside. Meredith lived at Milderhurst Castle, home of the famous author Raymond Blythe and his three daughters. After a while Edie decides to find out about her mother's life at Milderhurst and becomes entwined in the lives of the three sisters Blythe; Percy, Saffy and Juniper. The women are now quite elderly and still living inthe castle and the story begins to alternate between the two time frames.

This book is very much a modern Gothic. There is a castle, a love affair, a sister who is mentally unbalanced, a missing fiancée, a few stormy nights and secrets, secrets, secrets. Morton is quite adept at switching back and forth between the two story lines and ever so slowly peels back all the layers of the tale. It is at times creepy, moving and sometimes shocking. It seemed as if every time I knew where the story was going the author would shift it off into another direction.

The title The Distant Hours doesn't just refer to the story in the past but also is an inference to Edie and Meredith's relationship, which has never been close, and a relationship that Edie is hoping to repair by discovering the truth about her mother's past. In doing so she begins to also figure out a little about herself.

The rating of 4 stars reflects the fact that the book was a bit slow moving and the back-story took a little too long to set up.

Overall an entertaining read.

"The Distant Hours" was my first introduction to Kate Morton but it's definitely the start of a long-term relationship. What she has woven is a compelling tale reminiscent of the Gothic novels I used to read as a teenager, many of which featured a brooding manor house inhabited by equally brooding residents with dark secrets.

The setting here is an English castle that has not only fallen into sorry disrepair but also reflects the declining health, spirits and mental faculties of its three remaining survivors, the Blythe sisters. Morton seamlessly cuts back and forth between the late 1930's and the early 1990's, parsing out juicy clues throughout both journeys that are replete with red herrings. A third of the way into the book, I began embracing a smug belief that I had already figured everything out and knew what had probably happened to the youngest sister's lost suitor.

As the plot thickened, however, I realized that this was exactly what the author had wanted me to believe. Like Agatha Christie, she was absolute genius in this story at leaving the real clues scattered about in plain sight where they would be dismissed by the reader as irrelevant. As voracious a reader as I am - and for as many screenplays as I review in which writers try their hardest to surprise me - there were at least two "didn't-see-that-one-coming" moments in this book that were extremely well crafted and, more importantly, were entirely plausible.

Last but not least, "The Distant Hours" raises interesting discussion questions about family loyalties and the lengths to which people will sometimes go in order to control those around them. In the case of Percy, we have a presumably strong and unflappable persona who aggressively dreaded the thought of one day being left all alone and felt no remorse to implement that vision. As I read the book, I could easily draw parallels to one of my own relatives, a vain and bitter woman who determined that the most effective way to manipulate the actions of those around her was to threaten disinheritance every time they attempted to exert independence. Suffice it to say, the emotional extortion proved not to be sustainable in the end. She may have held on to every last dime but no one wept tears to see her go.

Christina Hamlett
Author of Eire Apparent

What I loved about THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN felt like too much of a good thing is this novel—a little too gothic or too Maeve Binchy or too many plot points that hinge on coincidences. Edie is a young woman who, together with a friend, runs a small publishing company. In 1992 she discovers that her mother Meredith, as a 12-year-old, was evacuated during the London blitzkrieg to a castle in Kent, owned by Raymond Blythe, who wrote a renowned scary children’s book. The other inhabitants of the castle are three unmarried adult sisters—Persephone (Percy), Seraphina (Saffy), and Juniper. Percy is overbearing; Saffy is maternal, and Juniper shows promise to follow in her father’s footsteps as a writer, but she is a little unstable. The narrative jumps around between 1992 and the WWII years, with several mysteries developing and being revealed to Edie along the way. However, even Edie never finds out what really happened to Juniper’s fiancé Tom, missing ever since the night he was supposed to join the sisters for dinner to announce his and Juniper’s engagement. The narration, however, is partly Edie’s and partly omniscient, so that we readers are not left in the dark about any of the family secrets, including the cruel terms of Raymond’s will. The author hints around at other intrigues, such as why Percy is so resentful of the housekeeper’s marriage and why Juniper becomes totally unhinged about Tom’s failure to show up and what sort of relationship Meredith had with Tom. Edie mostly wants to know what inspired Raymond’s scary children’s story, and I had exactly zero interest in finding out about that. No stones were left unturned, as the author wraps everything up neatly.

I was sadly disappointed with this book. After having read The Forgotten Garden I was looking forward to reading my 2nd book by Kate Morton.
After such a long build-up the ending was boring and rather disappointing. All those pages just to come to this?? And I had even more questions about Meredith and felt like things were left out about her character. So much time spent reading so many pages and for what? I can't recommend this book. I really wanted to like it.

I checked out the book-on-CD version from the library after reading the great reviews from this site. To my surprise, I almost gave up listening early on because the first few CDs were slow in story development due to the extreme details that seemed overbearing to me. It was also not easy to follow the story due to the back-and-forth changes in time frames, especially when all characters were read by one narrator only. I actually fell asleep listening to it so many times that was quite ridiculous. Fortunately, I convinced myself to continue and I have to say the best part was at the last CD when finally everything made sense and the ending was quite interesting and satisfactory.

I have to admit out of all Kate Morton's book (the three of them). I have to choose this as my favorite.. The Distant Hours did not play off of other books..movies..plays etc. This story seems to be original to the author imagination. However it was incredibly wordy and led the reader to believe the characters of the castle to each be off their rockers. I never felt a connections with any of them. And Ms. Mortons style of writing of bouncing back and forth between so many different dates and characters leaves me dizzy just like her other books. I enjoy a good mystery.. but The Distant Hours disappoints because the author leaves no bread crumbs for us to follow, but rather omissions of the story. We are left wondering when she will get back to where she abandoned us on the street corner waitng for the remainder of the tale. Thats how I felt.. she would began another part of the "mystery" then scamper off to another "mystery" just telling us enough to think we were learning something new. I think the characters of the book to be sad all of them.. so much coldness and dispair and lies and betrayals.. It was very hard to like Meredith and Edith was never really formed in my mind.. and of course the three sisters Percy was most unlikeable and Saffy was such a weak person and Juniper..bless her heart only wanted to be normal and no one would let the poor dear.. Also as with the other two books of Morton's.. they drink alot of tea. ALOT of tea.. so many tea breaks.. really I am a southern gal and we like out cold ice tea..but I dont deem it necessary to decribe every pot..mug..tea bag.. whew.. it got annoying fast.. maybe the next novel should incorporate coffee.. or lemonade.. or perhaps a water.. Regardless I still enjoyed parts of the book and may read it again..

The Distant Hours begins when its narrator learns that her mother was evacuated to a castle outside London during the blitz of WWII. She is curious about the story and the three sisters who lived in the castle with their father (a famous author) and slowly unravels the mysteries behind her mother's and the sisters' past.

I really love the way Kate Morton writes--she has a way of describing things that leaves me speechless. She'll toss in one-sentence descriptions that are so unique and vivid I find myself stopping short to read them again. Honestly I would read her books if only for that. She is also a master of time and point of view shifts--she unravels the story in a non-linear way that is brilliant and keeps you guessing and trying to piece together the clues from all the character's lives.

The Distant Hours was an enjoyable read, and had me particularly riveted at the end, wondering how she was going to tie everything together. The three sisters have complex, distinct personalities, and Morton slowly lets you get to know them and decide what you think of them (fascination? pity? love? disgust?) The ending had a definite gothic feel (think Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights) that I didn't particularly enjoy, but, like I said, I adore the way Morton writes so it was well worth the read.

<b>The Distant Hours</b> Kate Morton

Generously: ★ ★

OMG, compared to "The Forgotten Garden" this was a Total Stinker! Long, boring, prettily written, intriguing, and TOTALLY BO-RING!

Um: There is a mother, Meredith who as a child was sent away during the war to the country.... She was taken in by Juniper and cared for by Juniper & her two twin sisters Saffy & Percy (they lived in a castle).... Their father lived there too, in a tower, he was Artistic and Insane!

So this family, is "fragile" and has secrets & a past filled w/ tragedy...... Mother burned in a fire, siblings died young & tragically, father guilt ridden & terrorized by the past....... Saffy & Percy are hiding a secret and Juniper is tenuously holding on to a thin thread of sanity....

Father writes a story about a ghostly "Mud-Man"...... The publisher wants an anniversary edition.... Meredith has grown (with secrets), married and had a daughter who just happens to be the one to delve into the history & secrets of the Mud-Man as well as the secret connection her mother has w/ the family.

So, I know you'll wonder why I finished this Gawd-Awful book..... I wanted to find out the "Secret" and who-dun it. But it wasn't worth it.

I have: "The Secret Keeper" on my desk (but it might be a long time before I give Kate another chance), and I had: "The House at Riverton", but I added that to the Library's collection.

I saw Kate Morton's three books at a promo sale at Books-a-Million and they looked interesting. I looked at the reviews on Amamzon and most sounded promising. I checked out the Distant Hours from the local public library (because that was the only title they had) and was not disappointed. I disagree with the reviews giving only one star, but perhaps we are much different readers with different expectations. I do agree that I kept reading and waiting for something exciting to happen, but there was still enough going on in the plot to keep me interested. I omitted one star because although I don't mind stories that go back and forth in time, I felt this one did too much, cutting the reader off at a crucial detail (I suppose to build suspense), only to not return to that detail until the very end, thus going off in too many directions. Some important elements were introduced, or at least exponded upon, a bit too late in the story. It also seemed the last two chapters (or sections?) seemed oddly reversed. Overall, I am just a reader, not a literary critic, so I do commend Ms. Morton on a good job and good story. I must add that I truly appreciate her ability to tell a good story without unnecessary smut and oscenities. I have since ordered The Forgotten Garden and The House at Riverton and recommend this author to other readers out there.

The Distant Hours by Kate Morton was beautifully written, with a bittersweet love story as the main plot theme. The author has two stories linked together by the main character, Edie. The book is focused in the present with flashbacks to the beginning of WWII, and includes different points of view, depending on which character is the main focus of the chapter. Kate Morton often writes a scene from more than one point of view, giving the story almost a three dimensional edge.

I enjoyed the book thoroughly and read it nonstop over the course of a week. I use the word bittersweet because of the ending and revealing of the truth the three sisters have held for over fifty years. Edie learns a lot about the Blythe sisters and also learns to understand her estranged mother and in the process herself.

I heartily recommend this book for anyone who likes books with vivid descriptions, a sense of suspense and atmospheric setting.

I absolutely loved Kate Morton's The Forgotten Garden. This one, however, left me pretty disappointed. For starters, it took probably 200 pages just for me to get moderately interested in the story. The only reason I stuck with it was because I loved The Forgotten Garden so much. If this had been my first Morton book, I probably would have put it down never to pick up another.

Once I became interested in what happened, it did pick up. I enjoyed the latter half of the book. A good third of it could probably be omitted entirely - just way too much description and not enough action.

I originally gave book a 3-star review and thought I was being generous. I was frustrated at the slow pace of the atmospheric narrative. I found the revelation of layer upon layer of secrets to be tedious. The premise intrigued me from the start. A daughter goes to visit the country house where her mother was evacuated during World War II, an experience the mother has concealed from her daughter until recently. I always suspected there was a good story hiding in there, but unwilling to finish reading the book to figure it out. Recently however I wanted a recorded book to listen to, and on impulse I picked up this one for a second try. I am so very glad I did. Forced by listening to slow down and allow the story to wash over me in all its complexity I was completely pulled into the world it created. There is a wonderfully Gothic mystery that slowly reveals itself, a vivid picture of civilian life during World War II, and intriguing characters, most of whom are more complex than they at first seem. Do give this novel a chance to weave its compelling beauty around you. And if you find you can't get into it, try listening to the recorded version. Some books really do work better that way!

I love the way Kate Morton writes. Distant Hours has two story-lines...one that takes place in 1992 when the main character's mother receives a letter that had been mailed, but not delivered, fifty years prior. This letter sets off a series of events which leads the main character to find out more about her mother and part of her mother's life that she knew nothing about.
The second story-line is essentially about her mother's past...about the three sisters that the main character's mother went to stay with for 1 year during the start of WWII. The story was very engaging. I thought Forgotten Garden was better, but this story did not disappoint.

Everything starts out with a lost letter sent out 50 years too late. Then a distraction that leads the main character Edie to a sign post that reads Milderhurst 3 miles. Milderhurst castle, where Raymond Blythe wrote the Mud Man which started Edie love of reading, where Edies mother spent 18 months during the great war, where secrets are kept of missing love ones, where the ancient walls sing the distant hours, where three elderly sisters live together.

The book alternates from Edie's point of view in 1992, to the past with the Blythe sisters: Saffy, Percy and Juniper. The two time frames wrap together effortlessly as the story unfolds about the history of the Mud Man and the Blythe sisters.

Throughout this book, I kept feeling like there was going to be a big reveal, a big twist that would make me want to read the book again to see if I could catch it. But, the reveal, and the twist wasn't as big as I thought and it made me feel like I didn't get what I was promised. From the very beginning there is a lot of foreshadowing of things to come to prepare you for later events to make you think something big would happen. Things did happen, but it wasn't as big as I thought. But nevertheless I really enjoyed the book!

Edie is an editor at a small publishing company in England and is a quiet, introverted person, dreading having to tell her mother that she and her boyfriend have split and she will have to find a new place to live. When her mother receives an old letter, delayed 50 years in the post, Edie learns that her mother was evacuated from London in the war and went to live at Milderhurst Castle. Edie, by chance, visits the village, and is surprised to realize that she has been there before. She also finds out that her favorite book as a child, the True History of the Mud Man was written by a resident of the castle, Raymond Blythe. A tour of the castle brings further surprises when she meets the elderly twins Percy and Saffy, and their sister, Juniper, who appears to be suffering from madness/early Alzheimer's. The story of her mother's time at the castle and those of the sisters is told in a series of flashbacks. The sisters have a complex and complicated relationship and rivalry and Edie's relationship with her own family deepens as the story progresses. There are many mysteries and interlocking coincidences within the story and I kept anticipating some magical realism, and while this did not appear, the haunting writing and excellent characterization kept me hooked.

"the novel brings together many of my favorite things—a crumbling castle, a family of sisters, a love of books and reading, the haunting of the present by the past, thwarted love, ghostly shivers, mystery and memory and secrets." from the acknowledgement page of the novel 'The distant hours' by Kate Morton

Kate Morton's The Distant Hours, a Gothic tale of buried family secrets, is very reminiscent of Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale. Very reminiscent. Right down to the eccentric twins, spooky castle, and literary plot agents. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, as an evocative moody novel, is sometimes just the kind of book one craves.

Morton's story begins as a long lost letter reveals a family back story that our opening narrator, Edie, could never have imagined. At times hard to follow, the novel travels back and forth in time delivering the points of view of many of the main characters throughout the twentieth century. Highlights are: Morton's use the evacuation of children from London during WWII, a fascinating historical moment; her deft use of an imagined literary mystery, and the kind of family drama that layers and anchors her characters.

The Distant Hours is a rich and thick historically set treasure chest.

“It started with a letter. A letter that had been lost a long time, waiting out half a century in a forgotten postal bag in the dim attic of a nondescript house in Bermondsey.”

Okay. How can you not be immediately drawn into a book that begins like this? It gets better: the letter was written in 1941, in a castle, and was send to a girl who had spent time there as an evacuee from London during World War II. The narrator discovers that her mother is that evacuated child and this all leads to an amazing mystery involving a famous writer, his three daughters, and the disappearance of two men.

Having read three Kate Morton novels, all enjoyable, I can definitely say this is my favorite. I’m sure it’s merely for content. This is the kind of stuff that blows my skirt up. History, intrigue and a love story to boot. Not that Morton is really that into history. Nor is this a great work of literature. I would describe The Distant Hours as the kind of book you read in front of your fireplace while wrapped in a warm blanket, with absolutely no interruptions for a few hours at a time. It’s a real page-turner and highly entertaining.

As so many other reviewers commented as well--I loved two other books by this author and that is what drew me to this title when I saw it in my local library. Not only did the "mud man" idea not hold any appeal for me, the conflicting personalities of the three sisters set me on edge, especially when so many 'control freak' methods were applied by one of them. Actually it made me feel like screaming. And I could not find an ounce of respect for the so-called famous author father--even from the beginning of the story before his true character was revealed. It was such a drug-out story line that I can't even remember now what the long lost letter was about or if that detail was even given. The only good thing about the story was how Edie and her parents developed a closer relationship. I actually found Edie's part of the story to be much more interesting than the castle inhabitants and would have loved more details about her life and hopefully a new love that might have come about as a result of her involvement with the old castle.

I loved Morton's earlier novel, The Forgotten Garden, and had high expectations for this one as well. If this book wasn't tailored made for my reading tastes, I don't know what would be:
- Ancient castle in the bucholic English countryside
- Past and present plotlines weaving and intersecting
- Homage to books, readers and the written word
- Gothic elements galore (including madness, forbidden love, family secrets, a lost letter, and a creepy children's story)

However, by the end of this massive 560 page book, I was left closing the back cover with what I am sure was a comical "What-the-****-?" look on my face.

I hate to say it, but this book needed major red pencil attention by the editors IMO. Morton is a gifted writer, but this book suffered from too much literary cleverness at the expense of what should have been a gripping and taunt gothic mystery. It's not enough that she can write strings of beautiful sentences; there needs to be a satisfying conclusion to such a whopping tome that I've invested loads of not-so-distant hours toward finishing.

This time, the Morton magic didn't happen for me.

I have read all of Kate Morton's books and consider myself a fan. I was looking forward to The Distant Hours and I love the premise, but somehow this tale fell short. Oh, the plotting and description are masterful. The castle is creepy, the hints are dropped along the way and you are pulled along through the story. Somehow, though, it was a little too much Edward Gorey and not enough Daphne Du Maurier. For one thing, I didn't find myself caring much about the little old ladies (always a bad sign) and the one character I could find myself in sympathy with (Meredith) wasn't fleshed out until well into the book. By that time I had gotten a little impatient. I can't say that the ending was a terrible surprise, although some of the reveals were unexpected (and a little improbable perhaps). I love Morton's books so this one was a bit disappointing.

After reading a few of the reviews, I won't rehash the story line. I loved the book, although, admittedly, it takes a while to get into the story. This does not negate, maybe even authenticates, the author's scholarly writing skill equal to the Classics. Kate Morton is better than the best in novel writing. Her skill came through with each turn of the page. The details in the first half of the book does not waste the reader's time. It is a story, afterall, and the first 300 pages draw you in. You want to know what is going to happen to Edith, the three sisters, and Edith's melancholy mother. I've read two of Ms. Morton's three novels and both have been written with Dickens-like skill. I have ordered the first book, the House at Riverton. If you love to read, don't mind long books, and love mystery, you will love The Distant Hours.
Dawn Kurtz author of the Christian novel Secret of the Mexican Doll

Story is engrossing and has many layers; the author does a fine job of painting a haunting and creepy landscape for her story. There are lots of directions the reader thinks the plot may go, but then twists in another direction. I found it suspensfull, but I was not totally invested with the narrator, Edie, she sort of stands outside the plot as an observer. I wish there had been an "ah, ha" moment when she discovered more of a connection to the castle. And I never really understood her mother Meredith's angst about talking of her time there. Still don't understand why she kept it all a secret, and I can't even remember if the reader ever does find out what was so upsetting about receiving the letter from Juniper after so many years.

I would actually give this 3.5 stars - but rounded up to 4 because it was a pleasant book to go to every night to read; but did leave me a little unsatisfied.

Kate Morton's storytelling is enchanting. This book did not disappoint. I love that is has a distinctly female perspective, men only play peripheral roles and so the feminine voice and perspective is prominent. The lack of a love interest for the lead character is also refreshing. Kate's stories are never formulaic and I'm always excited to turn the page to see what is going to happen next. This book got me through two hospital stays and was a fantastic escape.

Second of Kate Morton's books I have read (The Shifting Fog/The House at Riverton was the first). Great mystery that kept me guessing to the end. I loved the thought of the old castle with all the family secrets and ghosts. I like the way Morton writes, going back and forth in time, slowly revealing the full story in both timelines bit by bit. I can't wait to read her first book, The Forgotten Garden.

I was quite fascinated with this book even given its length. It's not the type of book you can just blow through. The author spends a lot of time with character development and you will do yourself a huge disservice if you don't take your time with it. I found the writing beautiful and the storyline enchanting. The physical descriptions of the castle made me feel as though I could close my eyes and reach out and touch the moldering walls. I did feel a bit of disconnect between the relevancy of Edie's mother and her relationship to the main story. I suppose it was the "open door" to bringing the reader into the castle in the first place. The next book I want to read by Kate Morton is The Forgotten Garden. She has an uncanny ability to transport her readers to a different place and time. I am eager to see if she can perform her magic in that one as well.

I have read 2 of Kate Morton's books and was looking forward to reading a third. The Distant Hours was a disappointing read compared to the Forgotten Garden and the House at Riverton. The chapters jumped around so much that it was hard to follow. The ending was particularly weak and convoluted. It seemed as though Morton was trying to tie up loose ends to link it to the rest of the book but it was done in such a way that the reader felt the author was just trying to explain what really happened. n fiction, nothing is real so why not write in a way that the reader can discover the mystery along with the characters?

The author is a great writer and I never saw the ending coming- that being said, part of the reason I don't love this book as much as The Forgotten Garden is because I don't like the ending. It is a sad one and I wanted something else haha. Still a great novel that gets you emotionally invested.

Okay, that infamous line is never used, but it might as well have been. There WERE plenty of dark and stormy nights in this deliciously atmospheric novel of suspense. Like Ms. Morton's previous novels, this is a tale told in two times. The "contemporary" story is set in 1992, and events are set in motion by the delivery of a letter 51 years late. Protagonist Edie Burchill is visiting her parents when the letter arrives, and she witnesses her mother's unexpected and unexplained emotional response to the missive.

Questioning her mother, Meredith, Edie learns for the first time that her mother was evacuated from London during WWII. For over a year, she lived in the country with the sisters Blythe and their elderly father at gothic Castle Middlehurst. Meredith is inexplicably reticent to discuss her past. This is merely one more example of the distance that Edie has always felt with her mother. Edie finds the incident odd, but it fades quickly into the past--until months later, lost on a road trip, she stumbles upon Castle Middlehurst and her curiosity is fiercely awakened. On a whim, Edie arranges a tour of the castle and discovers, among other things, that all three sisters are alive and in residence. After several introductory chapters setting up the story, the book moves back and forth between Edie's answer-seeking in 1992, and chapters set during the actual events that occurred between 1939 and 1941, seen from the POV of several of the story's participants.

There is SO much more to the story told in this epic novel. The Blythes are a literary family, and patriarch Raymond is the author of the children's classic The True History of the Mud Man that inspired Edie's love of literature and eventual career in publishing. Ms. Morton is a brilliant story-teller and knows exactly how to torture her readers with questions. What was in the letter Meredith received half a century late? What was the true inspiration of the Mud Man? Why is the parlor door kept locked? What was in Raymond's will? What really happened that night in 1941?

So many questions. And Morton teases us along for hundreds of pages, stringing along answers like breadcrumbs for readers to follow. Kate Morton is very, very good at what she does. Though, after three novels, the similarities in the types of stories she tells and the themes therein have become quite evident. She's going to need to shake things up before she starts to recycle too much. But for now, The Distant Hours is hard to beat for good old-fashioned entertainment value. It literally brought chills and goose bumps to my skin time and time again. Savor it on a dark and stormy night!

This book has much to recommend it--wonderful setting, interesting characters, good (if at times slightly fevered) writing. But, I felt it was a couple of hundred pages too long. The story would have grabbed my interest much more if it hadn't been so drawn out--I grew impatient toward the end and just wanted the author to wrap it up. I also found the abrupt shifts in time a little jarring; one has to make sure to read the date for each chapter in order to keep up.

This book was a gift to me and I enjoyed it a lot. The story centers somewhat around a letter that arrives 50 years late. Wow. That is a good start for a story. There a musty old castle and mysteries to solve by the main character, Edie. I liked the setting and the gothic style.

I loved the Forgotten Garden and couldn't wait for this new book to come out. I was a little scared that I wouldn't like this one as much, or that the author had run out of ideas. I've been disappointed before with third and fourth books by authors that I previously liked, (Dan Brown being one) but this one did not disappoint! It took me a while to get into it, just like The Forgotten Garden, but once you understood what was going on, I couldn't put it down. It was a little mysterious, a kind of haunted castle, hidden secret from the past, thing going on. Even though it was a tad predicable, I was still surprised a few times. I liked the fact that everyone does not live happily ever after, that's just not real life, but she ties things up in the end in a way that gives hope for the remaining characters.

I really like the way Kate Morton writes. Her descriptions are so fresh and vivid that I feel like I've been transported to another time and place. Without recapping the whole book (that's already been done by others) I just want to say that after reading this book I was disappointed in authors that I used to read faithfully. It seemed like I had taken a literary step down and their descriptions seemed mediocre compared to Kate Morton.

Some have complained about the flashbacks, if you don't like that kind of story, this is not for you. Kate Morton seems to excel at someone from the present digging up the past. I guess I've always enjoyed wondering about those who've gone before and the lives that are dead and buried with them. Tragic secrets that come to light, years after the perpetrators are gone and forgotten. I just wish The True Story of The Mud Man was a real book, so I could read it too.

The Forgotten Garden was one of my favorite books, and The Distant Hours does not disappoint! I would definitely recommend this book. The plot interweaves the stories of several characters over several generations, and does it easily, just as in The Forgotten Garden. Kate Morton has such a wonderful way with words, and the characters feel very real. Just relax and let the book take you--it's a delicious escape and satisfying read. Can't wait for the next one, Kate!

I read this book because I had just visited Kent, where my ancestors came from. Not only did the book bring out many of the things I learned about WWII history in Kent, it led me through serpentine passageways of a mystery that had me binge-reading.

Although it was fairly clear early on what misdeed may have been done, it wasn't evident exactly what had been done, by whom, and how, until I read my way through the mayhem that was the history of three dear, entwined sisters, their father and a few guests that came their way.

Now that I've been introduced, I look forward to reading more from Kate Morton.

I was very disappointed with this book. I had just finished reading the Forgotten Garden written by her and loved it from beginning to end. I was looking forward to readidng another of her good books and this fell very short of that. Seems like the book was disconnected to me and I did not enjoy at all.

I get that this is an homage to gothic novels, I really do. In light of this, I was prepared to overlook the constant gloomy descriptions, the numerous clichés, and the overused "introduce a mystery and immediately move on to introduce another mystery while leaving the reader hanging" technique. Having said all that, there really is no excuse for packing so much extraneous material in your novel that you bog down the plot, or for making caricatures out of your characters as opposed to actual life-like people. But mostly what bothered me about this book is that I read over 500 pages only to be told exactly what the outcome was going to be long before the reveal. This means that what should have been the most riveting part of the book simply got skimmed, since it added absolutely nothing to the plot, the character development, or my understanding/enjoyment of the novel. Truly wanted to enjoy this book, now I'm just glad it's over and I can move on to something else.

To me, Kate Morton is a great writer. She has great perception and I love her decriptions of things and people and situations. I just felt there was too much of it in this particular book. I wanted to get to the juicy part and it took foreeeever to get there it seemed. I didn't have a hard time putting it down and coming back a couple of days later. So it just didn't stick with me. When I closed the book my first thought was it reminded me of the TV show Cold Case. It was interesting and fun but not my favorite. I am getting ready to dive into The Secret Keeper and am hoping that one will be more gripping like The Forgotten Garden. :-)

i had a bit of a hard time getting into this story - i know about every review i've found on this book here has been amazing, great, best book ever, etc. i agree it was well written and once i got into it, i had a hard time putting it down until i finished. but for me it quite a while before i DID find myself into it. i know it's a gothic novel and all that, but morton reeeeally takes her time establishing her characters and plot. but i ended up really liking the story - every time i'd guess an outcome of a character or plot point, i'd be wrong - you gotta love that. my mom had read this before me and told me it had a slow start, but to stick with it. i'm glad i did.

This novel was defeated by a narrative that was too often derailed by description piled on in excruciating detail or too much resort to extended interior ruminations by the characters. After a promising start -- Edie Burchill, driving in the English countryside, comes upon the old estate where her mother had been lodged as a child evacuee from London during the Blitz -- the story bogs down once Edie meets the three elderly Blythe sisters (the daughters of a famous author) who still live in the now-deteriorating mansion. The two older sisters, twins, are vividly portrayed, but at the author falls into the trap of preciousness when she describes every nuance and twitch of these "old dears." And, when describing a room or other setting, she seems unable to leave out any detail, no matter how trivial or redundant. There's supposed to be a many-layered story and even a mystery here, but the novel stalled almost completely long before it gained any traction. I gave up after reading about a third of it, with a feeling of immense relief.

I have done very few reviews and I am an avid reader. I am very impressed with the story and style of this writer! This is just an wonderful story, beautifully written and an absolute page turner! With so many junk books out there without writer's educated engrossing writing style, it was a total pleasure to discover Kate Morgan's book! I am planning to order all the other books this author has publshed. I HIGHLY RECCOMEND THIS BOOK to you.

Could not put this book down. It's like a puzzle you want to complete! From 1940's WW2 to 1990's, the characters are well defined by the author, yet just when you think you understand one of the women, a twist occurs. Kate Morton has written a well-paced mysterious tale that some might find too long or dragged out. I didn't! There was no need to turn back any pages...her details stay with you. I enjoyed the suspense!!

This book is special. It feels like opening some strange door, to a stranger place and instantly feeling at home. It has a great flow and is easy (no struggle to remember characters, plot or time period.) The words feel warm, used and maternal. Love, love, love it. This bookaholic, introvert is in Heaven.

After reading, and loving, The House at Riverton, I decided to read all of Kate Morton's tales. This is my second one and it was not a disappointment. She catches you right in the beginning with a mysterious letter and her mother's odd reaction to it. From there, it doesn't stop. There is a castle involved, full of strange sounds and lots of storms. It's a wonderful, haunting story, mysterious and enchanting.

The Distant Hours is written with the same skills as The House at Riverton. Her character development is marvelous and her descriptive language captivates you and doesn't let go.

I loved it and have added Kate Morton to my list of favorite authors.

The Distant Hours had the same elements as Morton's other novels - deep-seeded family drama and secrets, long lost loves. I really enjoyed the first two, but this one is by far the best. The story was extremely captivating and the twists at the end were unexpected but also completely logical - while I liked The Forgotten Garden, that twist in that book was a little too odd to be believable. All the characters were likable despite flaws and I honestly wanted things to work out for all of them. The ending had very nice closure. I would highly recommend this book. I look forward to Morton's next work.

This was the first Kate Morton book I read and I will be sure to read all her books.
Her writting is subtle, but rich in description and the chacarters are well described, you can almost see them. Yet the story is written in such a way that it is not predictable and a collection of coincidences and small details come together to form the big picture. The more I read of it, the more I wished that the story did not end. It is a great story, especially if you are looking to be surprised and the whole story is set out like a web so that pieces and bits fit together and come together slowly, forming a subtle suspense that will make you want to cling to the book until the very end. The way the author goes back and forth with the dates and carachters is also a refreshing touch. Written skillfully, you won't be able to take your hands off it and you'll go looking for more pages even as the story comes to an end.

At last, I finished reading Kate Morton's third book, The Distant Hours! I have been reading this book on and off for quite some time. I've read The Forgotten Garden (her second book) and absolutely loved it and then I read The House at Riverton, which I might not have liked as much as the former, but it was just as enjoyable. That made me really excited about her third book, which I expected to be even better than the second book, but it wasn't...

To be completely honest, the book did not hook me. The copy I had was 680 pages, and I found the first 150 pages interesting, but from there onwards until about page 480 I felt that the book dragged.
The book was not bad, it just wasn't as interesting as her former two.

The first part of The Distant Hours is fascinating, but the story itself is not particularly memorable. It is much less interesting than another book of Ms. Morton's--The Forgotten Garden--that I read first, and which inspired me to read this book. I will try another of her books before I give up.

Greetings Eager Reader,

I highly recommend most of Morton's novels, especially her latest one, The Distant Hours. Though this book follows some of her trademark patterns of having a twist at the end, Morton allows the reader to really fall through the pages into the time period following the thoughts and interactions of each character. If you want a read that will take you for a roller coaster ride while you keep in step with what life was like in the English WWII era, down to the smell and textile feel of the cold english nights were house lights had to be hidden, and butter had long been absent from the diet. I have read all of Morton's novels, and this is thus far my favorite! Enjoy!

I loved Kate Morton's first two novels and was very keen to read her latest offering "The Distant Hours".

So it is with a tinge of disappointment in reviewing this one that I have to report that her plot and characters just didn't get me in this time. The plot was way way way too simliar to what she has done before and I found the character of Edie in particular very hard to like. The lushness of the settings, along with the suspense and intrigue, that Morton has created before just wasn't there.

Maybe it's time for something new.

No spoilers, but when you get to the end of a book and you are sad you are there, you know you have bonded with the characters. I loved this book and would recommend it highly. Huge Kate Morton fan anyway, but this has to be her best in my opinion! Page turner, for sure!

This was one of those books that tried too hard to be fantastic. The premise is good. The setting is good; I enjoy stories set in World War 2 Britain. The story, while it has moments of brilliance, isn't that good. It flips back and forth between 1992 and 1941 in a convoluted twist and never lives up to its potential. The ending, where everything should finally come together and be revealed is anti-climatic. I never did connect with any characters. I simply found myself impatient for the story to be over. I should have stopped reading, but I kept wanting to give the book the chance to redeem itself. It never did.

The whole premise was a bit strange to me.....what was supposed to be so appealing about the fictitious book, THE MUD MAN, a book which was a central plot element in The Distant Hours? .Who in their right mind would give such a strange book to a child to read in the first place? The story lines were somewhat interesting, but I grew very weary of switching back and forth between one time period and another. She seems to manage to put a twisted moral element in her books, too, which doesn't appeal to me at all. Have read 3 of her books, and that's enough for me.

I really enjoyed reading the book. The story was enjoyable and really easy to read. It really kept my attention. The only thing that I didn't like was all of the descriptions. For every new scene of the book there was a new beyond detailed description of the room, the people, etc. At some points it was nice but others you just wanted to get back to the story.

This writer does not disappoint. I have never known an author to handle so many characters and situations this skillfully, tying up all scenarios neatly in the end.

And even more impressive is her use of suspense, not only regarding the central mystery of the novel, but in how she develops her characters. At first they seem one dimensional--almost caricatures. But in the end, they are unique and multi-faceted and you will never forget them.

I feel as if I will think about this book often in the future. What more can a reader ask!

I have read Kate Morton's other two books (The House at Riverton & The Forgotten Garden), but this was by far her best work! The writing is beautiful-- she really settles for nothing less than exactly what she wants to say. The phrasing perfectly describes the scenes, character's thoughts, etc., truly enabling the reader to become engrossed in the story, to experience and understand all that the Sisters Blythe felt.

I HIGHLY recommend reading this book. I've come across a fair number of disappointing reads as of recent and this was such a balm. I can't wait for her next novel!!

I very much enjoyed Kate Morton's first two novels: "The Forgotten Garden" and "The House at Riverton." Thus I eagerly awaited the release of "The Distant Hours." This book reprises the general framework Kate Morton's other two: A mystery is buried in the past. The present day protagonist seeks to uncover its secrets. The narration gracefully moves back and forth between time frames and we become involved with characters from both present and past. I enjoyed "The Distant Hours" well enough, but it felt a bit more formulaic and less inspired than Ms. Morton's other novels. Still---those who liked "The Forgotten Garden" and "The House at Riverton" should enjoy "The Distant Hours," if nothing else for its similarity to the previous two Kate Morton books. If you are deciding which Kate Morton book to buy, however, I would more strongly recommend either "The Forgotten Garden" or "The House at Riverton" over "The Distant Hours."

I wish I could give this ten stars. I gave "The House at Riverton," four stars because of a slight nit pick, and because I grade hard, and now I wish I could double the score because that's how much this marvelous young writer has improved in just a few short years. Lucky us!

The distant hours in this book are the whispers and secrets from the past lives of three sisters who live together in their family home, a crumbling, lonely castle. The book begins when the sisters are quite elderly but flashes back to their childhood and then to their years as young women during WWII. Told through their own eyes and the eyes of a young girl who was evacuated to stay with them during the war, the different points of view reveal misunderstandings as well as truths and the intricate plotting keeps the reader unsure about what actually happened that night in 1941, until the very end. I loved every minute I spent with this book.

I'm a huge Kate Morton fan, and her new book "The Distant Hours" does not disappoint. Great characters: great women characters that are so well described that you can see them in front of you. A good mystery...well, several good mysteries...that get pieced together going back and forth from the mid-1990s to the english countryside during WW2. And finally, like in her other books, Morton explores family dynamics and really what it means to be a family, and what are our roles in and obligations to our families? This book is so hard to put down. Highly recommend.

Her books are so intricate and detailed. You really have to pay attention to what you are reading. She jumps back and forth from one generation to another. I loved the book it kept me on my toes and I didn't want to miss anything.

Kate Morton is Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl for grown-ups.

While she doesn't write about magic faraway trees or boys who live in giant peaches, she has a gift for storytelling that sweeps you up into the lives of her characters and their worlds.

Morton has written three books to date - The Shifting Fog / The House at Riverton, The Forgotten Garden and The Distant Hours.

Each book is set in the grand manor houses of early 20th century England. Present day events become loose threads that unravel the long-held secrets contained within their walls.

I loved all three books so much I can't pick a favourite and I recommend them all.

Sometimes I wished that the story had been told chronologically as it happened and did not involve constant flashbacks. I would have read it more quickly without losing track of what happened when I had put the book down and picked it up later.

This book is so boring. It took ages to finish it and in the end there is no justification to the story. It's just a ghastly tale. Utterly boring. It's nearly 700 pages of a story that could be told in about 20. Everything ends badly for everyone. Not that that couldn't be refreshing (I'm not looking for a book where everything is peachy) it's just a heads up. It's a dark and depressing story.

I think Kate Morton is a first class author and I zipped through her other books = BUT --- this one was tedious. It took me longer to read but I still found it quite enjoyable. I'll always purchase her offerings but just be prepared for a long and very strange story with a stunner at the end. Good purchase = please do.

This is the third book that I have read by Kate Morton and found them to be all a good story line with lots of fore shadowing and good plots. I thought that I had figured out part of the mystery about the sisters and then discovered another line of possibilities to the mystery. I like the fact that there was no cussing, or sexual discriptions of realationships between characters. It is a good story not to long but just long enought to hold your interest and make you want to hurry up to the finish. I would tell any of my friends to read this book, or the other books by Kate Morton that I have read, Forgotten Garden, and The House At Riverton.

I was enthralled by The Forgotten Garden and liked a lot The House at Riverton but this one is a complete mystery to me as to why she got so off the track. I think maybe a little too many morose classics in her repertoire. In all honesty I haven't finished the book but I don't know if I can stay awake long enough to finish it. She goes on for paragraphs about a dress or the messiness of a room when I just want her to get on with the relevant tale. In The Forgotten Garden I couldn't wait to pick it up again and ignored my duties just to secret away with it. With this one I'm about to give up. Will update this review if I ever get through it. I have been waiting with bated breath for months for this book. What a boring disappointment.
Update: Well I finished the book and after the first third being horrible the real Kate Morton reappeared and authored as she had in the past. The story finally took off moving well and providing sufficient mystery. I really enjoyed the second half. I'm still only upgrading this book to three stars because of the awful beginning (I agree too that The Mud Man is not a story children would really enjoy and opening with it immediately disinterested me). I wonder about the people she asks to read this before publication. Didn't anyone encourage her to tighten up the script? Well, hopefully people pick up her other books before this one.

I loved this book so much I just had to show it on my first review ever. I loved the Forgotten Garden and so I kwnew I was not gonna be dissapointed by this other book by Kate Morton, but The Distant Hours has been well beyond my expectations.

I'm not a native english-speaker, so I surely sometimes can't appreciate how a book is beutifully written, but even though I just loved the way this book is written, the choose of words sounds almost magical, the pace of the story is so enjoyable and engaging ... I just couldn't put it down, but at the same time I was trying to read it slowly, to savour every chapter so the book will last.

Many things reminded me of The Forgotten Garden while reading The Distant Hours: The plot and the way the story is told going back and forth on time, the way there is a main voice telling the story (a young woman with a difficult relation to her mother, ...), how different characters lead the narration sometimes, the aim being to unravel a mistery from a loved-one's past.

As other people have already said, this a perfect book for reading by the fire, while raining outside. Take it on a holiday to some cold place and you will love it, or read it at home... you will love it anyway!.

Please take the time, money and opportunity to have Kate Morton's books "The Hidden Garden", " The House at Riverton", and others available in the text-to-speech format.
Young women and girls who struggle with reading at a rate that allows them to enjoy the book, read in a comprehensive manner and imagine new and exciting adventures benefit from the text-to-speech style. Plus it encourages them to read and build their knowledge about new people, relationships, and different cultures and life styles.
The books are excellent learning adventures and everyone should be able to find the opportunity to enjoy a 'good read".

I agree with the negative reviews: my specific point of contention with the book is that it lacks coherence. There simply isn't THAT much of a connection between Meredith and the castle -- and if you will, the character of Juniper. In particular, there is very little substance to the lost letter. I thought, at first, that perhaps there was some sort of twisted love triangle, where Meredith impeded the romance and engagement; but that turned out not to be the case (so much for "too late"). There is even less reason for Edith to concern herself with the castle -- but for her obsession with the Mud Man book. Too many unanswered questions remain unresolved (such as the bloody shirt). What started off as a promising book (albeit based on hackneyed premises -- a large house full of secrets, scandals and mysteries surrounding the characters) turned out to be a major disappointment, in the end.

I got this book up at the airport before hopping on my flight, so I didn't think alot about it before my purchase. At first, I found the general flow of the story a little off-putting. To all potential readers: Pay Attention. The story skips around alot (from past to present, character to character, etc.). There were several times when I considered putting it down b/c it was just too much work to read, but I'm glad I didn't. By the time my flight ended and I was about half way through the book, I didn't want to put it down. It is an intriguing tale and you won't regret taking the journey with "Edie" as she uncovers long-kept secrets and helps set free a family bound by love, tragedy, and the unforgiving passage of time.

This book starts off a little slow but please dont give up once you get more into the book you realize what a great author this is. She did a great job of putng this book together and capturing the readers attention through the whole thing. Im definitely going to read her other two books and I hope theyre as good as this one.

This is a haunting tale of three sisters and their life in the English country side during WWII. From the beginning I could see that the book was beautifully written. I had one problem with it about half way through where I wanted to give it up though because I felt the story was moving too slowly for me, but I stuck with it and I'm glad I did because after that I could not put the book down

The Distant Hours was a very well-written piece of historical fiction. It was a little lengthy but needed for full development of how each character's lives intersected. It had mystery and romance and a bit of quirkiness. The author writes in such a beautiful style that it kept me reading for hours!

I love Kate Morton's way with words, her creativity, the mystery of "who dun it" but it was an easy book to put down for awhile and I tend to base how much I like a book on how hard it is to stop reading it at any point. I would recommend it to anyone who likes to take his/her time reading a book and who appreciates good literature.

I won't restate what so many reviews have already said, and said very well. The problem that I found with the book was that Kate Morton took so long to make the characters personal. Too much time was spent just describing the characters and their actions, and in such an impersonal way that I was bored with the characters (especially the Blythe sisters) for the first half of the book. Just describing a character's actions doesn't help the reader to care about the characters. Once the sisters began interacting with each other, with dialogue, it was much more natural to care about them and they became more real.

I actually ordered this through audible.com and listened to it on the drive to Jacksonville. What a great story! An old haunted house, spinster sisters, a young writer searching for truth and family secrets. The flashbacks are seamlessly mixed into the present day narrative and it has a wonderfully entertaining plot. But like so many of this genre, the ending was just a bit expected. That does not detract from the overall story. It is rich and absorbing. The characters are flawless, including the house which has a life of its own.

A chilled room, a laprobe, a cup of strong, sweet tea and "The Distant Hours" equals heaven! Elements of the Gothic novel,woven with the imaginative verbs of a talented writer, make for a page turner of intense delight which stirs the imagination into a frenzy, plays sweet to scary tunes on your heartstrings, and keeps your mind working to solve the mystery. You will FEEL this novel. What isn't to love?

This book was received very timely and was in the condition expected. Although I am a fan of Kate Morton I did not enjoy this book as much and did not finish so I will pass it along for other's enjoyment.

Yes, Morton can write, but this one was trite. Definitely her weakest effort. I don't want to give anything away, but the "surprising" plot twists were utterly predictable. And at least one piece of the plot was a shameless rip-off of DuMaurier. Frankly, I don't regret reading it, but it could have been so much more compelling if Morton strayed from the formula a bit. Truth is, I would have preferred "The True History of the Mudman" -- if it actually was a book. Alas, it isn't.

This book is well-written, well-thought out and the characters are interesting and really come to life in this book. I love the nuances of the various relationships and the parallel lives between mother and daughter. The story had me thinking about it long after I finished the book, which to me is a true test of a great read. I'd never read this author before but will definitely buy more.

I loved The Forgotten Garden and House at Riverton and was excited to read The Distant Hours (despite some poor reviews on the store). I have to agree with those who were disappointed in this book. I almost aborted it until the second third of the book finally kicked in, but the last third was disjointed and forced. It felt like Ms. Morton couldn't figure out how to end it and added every "tortured" possibility to see what would stick. Three stars is probably too much, but the middle third of the book kept me wanting to finish it and at least made it worth my while.

I have no idea what the "one-star" reviewers are talking about. I read "The Forgotten Garden," and while an engrossing read, the ending left me flat...I had figured it out in the begining and kept thinking there had to be something more. Anyway, that was not the case in the Distant Hours. I found myself second guessing myself throughout and then being genuinely surprised with it's ending. A wonderful book. Perfect for stormy nights or clear spring days. If you like gothic novels with large estates, captivating scenery and an intricate mystery, you'll love The Distant Hours.

I love her writing style. She is an excellent author. The plot all comes together at the end of the book. Some mysteries are easy to figure out but hers are not. The book keeps me intrigued all the way through.

A compulsive and delicious read, full of twists and surprises. Loved the drama of family secrets and the way all the intertwined stories fit perfectly into the puzzle's conclusion. Haven't read such a romantically creepy and suspenseful book since du Maurier's Rebecca. Milderhust is the new Manderley.

I hope a movie is made from this book!

I will never forget these twins & their secrets. The twists in this book are excellent and well worth staying up all night to read about. This book is well worth every penny you pay for it. A book worth reading several times over!

Kate has produced another heat book that takes you back and forth between the past and present. A book full of well designed characters and plot that allows a reader of any age to enjoy this book. It has been passed between readers in their 20s to readers in their 70s and all have enjoyed