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Music in the Dark

By: Sally Magnusson
Narrated by: Siobhan Redmond
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Publisher's summary

'Wonderful and moving' Clare Chambers

'Utterly absorbing' Sunday Post

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WINSTON GRAHAM HISTORICAL PRIZE

The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction - Long-listed

Jamesina Ross is long finished with men. But one night a stranger seeking lodgings knocks on the door of her tenement flat. He doesn't recognise her, but she remembers him at once. Not that she plans to mention it. She has no intention of trusting anyone enough to let herself be vulnerable again.

A lifetime ago, growing up in a Highland glen, Jamesina Ross wrote songs about the land and the kin who had worked it for generations. But her music was no match for the violence her community faced in the Highland Clearances. Jamesina has borne the disfigurements of that day ever since, on her face and inside her head. Her lodger thinks that if she would only dare to open the past, she might have the chance of a future.

This is a story about resilience, memory, resurrection - and those parts of who we are that nobody can take away.
A beautiful exploration of unlooked-for love in later life, its contrariness and its awkward, surprising joys, this is a story about resilience, memory, resurrection - and those parts of who we are that nobody can take away.

©2023 Sally Magnusson (P)2023 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
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Critic reviews

"Music in the Dark is a beautifully-written piece of work, achieved with immense skill. The portrayal of Jamesina Ross as she is shattered and put back together by the light-touch constancy of Niall Munro is perfectly balanced. The minute focus on these two individuals tells a huge story of the C19th Highlands, Glasgow and North America that readers will find deeply affecting." (Shona MacLean)

"An engrossing, beautifully written novel about the Highland Clearances and the long-term physical, emotional and psychological damage done to those who were forced from their homes and homeland. Like all good historical fiction, it both illuminates the past and speaks eloquently to the present." (James Robertson, author of The Testament of Gideon Mack)

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