A brilliant young woman who sees the dead is caught up in a dangerous mystery surrounding a foreboding estate and the merciless man obsessed with it in the gorgeously atmospheric and adventurous gothic fantasy Weavingshaw by Heba Al-Wasity, the beginning of a trilogy.
Leena Al-Sayer must make a terrible bargain to save her deathly ill brother. She has no money for his medicine, so she approaches the ruthless man known as the Saint of Silence, a play on his real name, St. Silas. The Saint pays for confessions, and Leena offers to sell him her innermost secret--that she has the ability to see and communicate with ghosts. St. Silas maneuvers Leena into a deeper bargain: he will save her brother, but in return, she will work for him until she finds the ghost of Percival Avon, the former master of an estate known as Weavingshaw.
Every mystery Leena encounters draws her further into the ominous shadow of Weavingshaw and a more intimate understanding of the enigmatic Saint and the forces that ensnare him. Al-Wasity builds a vibrant fantasy world infused with international conflict in which the political interacts with the paranormal. Leena and her family are refugees from a war-torn country building a new life in a setting that resembles Britain during the Industrial Revolution. The deep-seated yearning that develops between Leena and St. Silas has its roots not only in their potent chemistry but also in their mutual abuse at the hands of the systems in power. Packed to the brim with mystery, pathos, and that which goes bump in the night, Weavingshaw is a gothic fantasy lover's dreamland. --Jaclyn Fulwood, blogger at Infinite Reads