Winter Ghosts [Audiobook, CD, Unabridged] [Audio CD]

Kate Mosse (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2009

March 1928. The Great War has been over for ten years, but Freddie Abrahams still hasn't recovered from the loss of his brother. Even now, on holiday in south-west France, he cannot escape his grief. When his car crashes, Freddie stumbles down from the hills to a village nearby. There he meets Marie, a beautiful young woman who is also mourning a lost generation. Her story of the fate of her family moves him deeply. But it will also lead Freddie to the caves above the village - and to the heart of a shocking secret. By turns thrilling, poignant and haunting, this is a story of two lives touched by war and transformed by courage

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Mosse's wisp of a new novel (after Sepulchre), Freddie Watson is a stilted young man who has not gotten over older brother George's disappearance on the Western Front during WWI. It is now 10 years since the Armistice, and Freddie, after a stay in a mental institution, has come to the French Pyrenees to find peace. While motoring through a snowstorm, he crashes his car and ends up in the small village of Nulle, where he meets a beautiful young woman named Fabrissa. In the course of an evening, Fabrissa tells Freddie a story of persecution, resistance, and death, hinting at a long-buried secret. By the next morning, she is gone, leaving Freddie alone to unlock a ghostly mystery hidden for 600 years. This is a staunchly old-fashioned story, taking fully 100 pages to get moving, and by the time things pick up, the gist of the narrative will be obvious to anyone who has ever sat through a Twilight Zone episode. Freddie's obtuseness does little to help along a gruel-thin story. (Feb.)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Slimmer than either of her previous titles, Labyrinth (2006) and Sepulchre (2008), Mosse’s latest is set in the years after World War I. Devastated by the death of his older brother, George, in the war, Freddie Watson has traveled to France after recovering from a nervous breakdown on his twenty-first birthday. While driving through the French Pyrenees on a snowy afternoon, he loses control of his vehicle and nearly takes a fatal plunge off the mountains. After managing to free himself from the car, Freddie makes his way to the village of Nulle, where he finds lodging and is invited by the kindly hostess to a celebration that evening. When Freddie makes his way to the town gathering, he meets a beautiful young woman named Fabrissa, who urges him to open up about his grief over George’s death, and shares her own tragic story. The next morning, Freddie awakens with a fever and an overwhelming desire to find Fabrissa, at any cost. Evocative, atmospheric, and mysterious, Mosse’s ghostly tale is the perfect diversion for a chilly winter day. --Kristine Huntley --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Orion Publishing; Unabridged edition (October 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1409113264
• ISBN-13: 978-1409113263
• Product Dimensions: 5.6 x 0.6 x 5.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,637,446 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kate Mosse is the author of the # 1 International bestseller LABYRINTH, and a presenter for BBC television and radio in London. Born in 1961, she grew up in West Sussex, England, she read English at Oxford and holds honorary MAs from Oxford and Chichester Universities. A publisher for seven years, she is the Co-Founder & Honorary Director of the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Orange Award for New Writers, the prestigious annual literary awards celebrating international writing in English by women. She is also a television and radio presenter for the BBC in London, fronting such series as 'The Readers & Writers Roadshow' and 'Open Book.'

Previous books include Becoming a Mother and The House: Behind the Scenes at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, as well as two novels Eskimo Kissing and Crucifix Lane. LABYRINTH, her international # 1 bestseller, was published in the UK in July 2005. A Sunday Times #1 bestseller in hardback and paperback, and a New York Times Top 10 bestseller, it was the over all best selling book in the UK for 2006 and won 'Best Read of the Year' in the British Book Awards. It is also shortlisted for the IMPAC international literary award, for a CWA Steel Dagger and has been shortlisted for 'Author of the Year' for the 2007 British Book Awards. LABYRINTH is published in 40 countries.

A former Executive Director of Chichester Festival Theatre, Kate is a member of the Royal Society of Arts, a Board member of the international sponsorship organisation Arts & Business, Kate was named International Woman of Achievement in 2000 for her contribution to the Arts.

Kate lives with her husband and two teenage children in Sussex, England, and Carcassonne, southwest France.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars deja vu?, March 17, 2011

By 

Jessica Lynn - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Winter Ghosts (Hardcover)

I absolutely loved Kate Moss's previous books and was eager to read this one. When I started to read the book, it was all too familiar to me. I realized that I already read this book! She had written a young adult book, titled 'The Cave' that I read a while back. This is the same book-- no significant alterations, if any! I was very disappointed to waste money on a book I already read-- with just a new name and face. I feel very cheated... and this is the first and only review I have written on Amazon!

The Cave (Quick Reads)

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A pleasantly eerie tale that leaves you wanting more, February 4, 2011

By 

Cathy G. Cole (Phoenix, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Winter Ghosts (Hardcover)

First Line: He walked like a man recently returned to the world.

It is 1928, and Freddie is still mourning the death of his older brother in World War I. Traveling as a way to both learn and escape, he finds himself high in the French Pyrenees. He loses control of his car in a snowstorm and is forced to walk through the woods until he finds a small village where he can take refuge until his car is repaired.

Invited to a village celebration, Freddie meets the beautiful and ethereal Fabrissa who is also mourning the loss of loved ones. During the course of the night, Freddie and Fabrissa share their stories, and when dawn breaks, Freddie not only uncovers an ancient mystery, he also discovers his own role in the life of this remote village.

Having previously read Mosse's other two novels, Labyrinth and Sepulchre, I expected an engrossing tale densely layered with the atmosphere and history of the French Pyrenees. I was not disappointed. Almost from the moment Freddie stepped foot in the quiet, tiny village, the hairs on the back of my neck began to prickle. He was a young man so in need of being rescued-- and of being the rescuer-- that I couldn't help but keep my fingers crossed as he navigated the streets of an ancient place where nothing was really as it seemed to be.

The only quibble I have with this book is that, at one third the size of her previous two novels, I felt a bit cheated. The marvelous atmosphere had time to build only so far before the tale was finished, and my unease allowed to melt away like wisps of fog. If the book hadn't felt so rushed, I would now be waving it around in the air exclaiming, "You've gotta read this!"

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Freddie, March 12, 2011

By 

Linda Pagliuco "katknit" (CT, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Winter Ghosts (Hardcover)

Kate Mosse has taken the history of the Cathars, a persecuted religious sect in 14th century France, and made it her own. In her third novel, The Winter Ghosts, she departs from the archaeo-thriller genre to try her hand at a ghost story. Freddie Watson has lost ten years of his life to his grief over the death of his beloved brother in the Great War. Having recovered from a severe breakdown, he's mentally and physically fragile, and his physician recommends an extended holiday. Freddie decides to drive through the Languedoc, and, caught in a snowstorm in the Pyrennees, he crashes his car and must take refuge in a remote village. He's struck by the loneliness of Nulle, but is grateful to be given shelter by a kindly woman who runs a small inn. She invites him to the village fete, to which everyone wears medieval clothing. Feeling rather silly, he accepts, and is pleased to make the acquaintance of a lovely young woman in a long blue robe. Both Freddie and Fabrissa have suffered shattering losses, and they are drawn to each other, sharing their experiences throughout the long evening.

Ms. Mosse populates this evocative tale with cobbled lanes, hidden caves, mysterious ruins, and mountainous pathways. Because Freddie is psychologically exhausted, he's also more susceptible to the vibrations of violence, death, mourning, and compassion. Little by little, he comes to understand the shadows which darken Nulle, and to find release from his own shadowy struggle. Did he encounter some sort of "time-slip", or is his awakening attributable to his own psychological healing?

While this is no horror story, The Winter Ghosts, with its restrained yet evocative prose and atmospheric setting, may continue to haunt you long after the last page has been turned.