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  • Published: 15 February 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099563693
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 368
  • RRP: $29.99

The Uninvited Guests




The prizewinning and No 1 bestselling author Sadie Jones moves to a gorgeous and bewitching historical setting in a blissful new novel full of spooky surprises - 'promises to fill a large, Downton Abbey-shaped hole in one's cultural life' - Charlotte Sinclair, Vogue

A sinister tale of haunting beauty, from The Outcast author Sadie Jones.

It is the eve of Emerald Torrington’s twentieth birthday and the family has assembled at Sterne, the once grand, now crumbling, family seat. The cake is iced, the wine decanted, the house gleams invitingly.

But before the first dish can be served, a mysterious group of strangers arrives at the door. Victims of a local train accident they are seeking shelter at the house.

The Torringtons welcome them in but there is something unsettling about the group and, as night falls and a storm rages outside, the family begins to wonder if something more malevolent than stranded travellers is in their home...

  • Published: 15 February 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099563693
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 368
  • RRP: $29.99

About the author

Sadie Jones

Sadie Jones is a novelist and screenwriter. Her first novel, The Outcast (‘Devastatingly good’, Daily Mail) won the Costa First Novel Award in 2008 and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize. It was also a Richard and Judy Summer Reads number one bestseller and adapted for BBC Television. Her second novel, Small Wars (‘Outstanding’, The Times; ‘One of the best books about the English at war ever’, Joel Morris), was published in 2009, and longlisted for the Orange Prize. Her third, in 2012, was The Uninvited Guests (‘A shimmering comedy of manners and disturbing commentary on class... a brilliant novel’, Ann Patchett) followed by Fallout in 2014 (‘Intoxicating and immersive’, The Sunday Times).

Also by Sadie Jones

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Praise for The Uninvited Guests

The Uninvited Guests is at once a shimmering comedy of manners and disturbing commentary on class. It is so well-written, so intricately plotted, that every page delivers some new astonishment. It is a brilliant novel

ANN PATCHETT, author of State of Wonder

What a delicious read! Like something written by a wicked Jane Austen, here is love and error in a ramshackle manor house complete with railway survivors, a birthday party and a pony. I was completely captivated by its madcap nature and then, utterly unprepared for the strange fruit that the story became. Passing like a spring fever, here is a fairy tale that stays with you long after it is gone. I couldn't put it down

SARAH BLAKE, author of The Postmistress

What opens as an amusing Edwardian country house tale soon becomes a sinister tragi-comedy of errors, in which the dark underbelly of human nature is revealed in true Shakespearean fashion. Sadie Jones is a most talented and imaginative storyteller, and The Uninvited Guests is a very clever novel

JACQUELINE WINSPEAR, author of Elegy for Eddie

This creepy and entertaining tale unfolds around a fascinating cast of charactesr, and Jones's loving eye for period detail misses nothing

Clare Longrigg, Psychologies

Fans of The Outcast and Small Wars won't be disappointed. Wonderfully spooky and atmospheric

Viv Groskop, Red

With its Mitfordesque dialogue and pacy plot, this is a deliciously fun read

Beatrice Hodgkin, Easy Living

What a delicious literary cocktail Sadie Jones's latest novel is: part suspense, part Edwardian romcom, richly evocative of time and place... It's a spiffing tale and, even though it is at bottom a metaphysical love story, it is far more believable than Downton Abbey

Sebastian Shakespeare, Tatler

A modern Mitford saga

ASOS Magazine

Cooly playful...the luscious prose is precisely steered

Helen Dunmore, Guardian

The Uninvited Guests is a bizarre and exuberant comedy of manners, combining elements of romance with those of the carnival....it is a great deal of fun, and a welcome alternative to more traditional country-house dramas

Hannah Rosefield, Literary Review

The prose is visceral, rich with "the smell of many wounds", and thick with painterly detail

Sunday Telegraph

Award-winning Sadie Jones' third novel is her best yet. Hugely enjoyable with a superb, supernatural twist

Tablet

Dazzlingly well-written. The style is exuberant and extremely funny. This is a midsummer's night dream of a book, mythic and unforgettable

Financial Times

Darkly humorous, quirky and engrossing, this is a ghostly tale full of twists and turns

Choice Magazine

She takes relish in recreating a familiar Edwardian landscape, peopled by eligible cads and imperious dowagers... Jones’s highly combustible period piece makes the dramas at Downton look like a stroll in the park

Emma Hagestadt, Independent

I will be surprised if I read anything stranger this year but I can’t help admiring Jones’s whimsical invention and the quality of her writing

Vanessa Berridge, Daily Express

Stylish, witty and inventive

Independent on Sunday

Beautifully written with real popular appeal, this cannot fail to be another winner

Sunday Herald

A creepy tale….set in a country house awash with secrets and strange happenings

Bella magazine

Highly entertaining… An elegant comedy of manners with the usual undercurrents of jealousy, desire and conflicting loyalties… Jones shows that she can turn her talent for storytelling to a more stylised form with a light and playful touch, and without compromising her sharp insights into the human heart

Stephanie Merritt, Observer

An intelligent and poignant reflection on death and loss… a fabulous read

Lesley Mc Dowell, Glasgow Sunday Herald

Sadie Jones…enters new literary territory with a whimsical Edwardian farce that takes its lead from the darker offerings of Saki and JB Priestley...The novel's denouement is satisfyingly outlandish

Emma Hagestadt, Independent

With elegant ease, Jones spins a good old-fashioned comedy of manners

Katie Owen, Sunday Telegraph