MORNING, AFTERNOON, NIGHT. THE MOTHERS ARE ALWAYS WATCHING . . .

‘Brilliant . . . Chidgey’s luxurious and unhurried prose stokes tension in a compulsive thriller’ Observer

‘Written with insight and brio, deftly balancing darkness and light, depth and pace’ Guardian

‘Grand and devastating, and packed with perfectly timed revelations . . .This involving, humane novel brims with vitality – and soul’ New York Times

‘Chidgey writes with surgical precision and emotional weight . . . quietly devastating, fiercely intelligent and unforgettable’ Irish Times

‘Eloquent prose, rich characterizations, and knotty concepts – an emotional and intellectual tour de force’ Kirkus

‘Brilliant . . . you will race through this book in a single, breathless sitting’ Literary Review

England, 1979. Vincent, Lawrence and William are the last remaining residents of a secluded New Forest home, part of the government’s Sycamore Scheme. Every day, the triplets do their chores, play their games and take their medicine, under the watchful eyes of three mothers: Mother Morning, Mother Afternoon and Mother Night.

Their nightmares are recorded in The Book of Dreams.
Their lessons are taken from The Book of Knowledge.
And their sins are reported in The Book of Guilt.

All the boys want is to be sent to the Big House in Margate, where they imagine a life of sun, sea and fairground rides. But, as the government looks to shut down the Sycamore Homes, the triplets begin to question everything they have been told.

Gradually surrendering its dark secrets, The Book of Guilt is a profoundly unnerving exploration of belonging in a world where some lives are valued less than others.

‘What a book! Tense, inventive, mysterious and moving, The Book of Guilt poses big questions in the context of a rocketing plot. I loved it completely’ Karen Joy Fowler, author of Booth

‘Original, dark, clever and compelling’ Mary Ann Sieghart, author of The Authority Gap

‘This is a compelling and terrifying novel whose alternative history engages chillingly with current possibilities. No one writes children better than Chidgey. She exactly gets their experimental cruelty and related innocence as they attempt to piece their world together’ Elizabeth Cook, author of Lux

Author Biography

Catherine Chidgey is the author of In a Fishbone Church (1998), Golden Deeds (2000), The Transformation (2003), The Wish Child (2016), the ‘found novel’ The Beat of the Pendulum (2019), Remote Sympathy (2021), Pet (2023) and The Axeman’s Carnival (2024). Her novels have been published to international acclaim and have been shortlisted and won numerous prizes. She lives in Ngāruawāhia, New Zealand, and lectures in Creative Writing at the University of Waikato.