The Hollow Vow

In the Vale of Hollows, the dead stay down only when licensed hands prepare them, and once a generation every great family pays. When her grandmother dies in the middle of a warning, Wren Mourvale reads the family ledger. Her name is already in it, in ink older than she is. So she does her sums, signs in blood, and goes down sixty steps to marry the god entombed beneath her family’s estate. One year as his bride, and her sister goes free. The terms leave out two things: the year is taken from her life and fed to the stone, and her husband’s touch kills. They show her on a rose. They dine at a table built for distance. He keeps his hands behind his back. The house keeps moving her room closer to his tomb. As his buried memories return and bleed into her dreams, somebody tries to poison her, and the church that arranged the marriage turns out to be keeping a second set of books. Gothic romantasy, dual point of view, slow burn. For adult readers: explicit scenes between consenting adults late in the book; the Content Note at the front lists the rest. Vale of Six Tombs, Book One. The Content Note and Chapters One to Three are free.

Film & TV, translation, foreign print, audio drama rights available — inquire at the Rights Desk

The full book is coming soon. Chapter One is free to read now, no signup. Follow Lenore Ashe below and you will get one email the day it is out.

When you buy this book, $3.99 goes to the author — paid weekly. DRM-free. Yours forever. Already bought it and lost the link? Get it back here.