The Haunting of Las Lágrimas

An atmospheric Gothic ghost story, where The Silent Companions meets Daphne du Maurier in South America and a woman faces the darkness bestowed by vengeance. 'A phantasmagoric mixture of M. R. James, The Shining and The Turn of the Screw set among the otherworldly Argentinian Pampas.' - EDWARD PARNELL, author of Ghostland Winter 1913. Ursula Kelp, a young English gardener, has come to Argentina to restore the gardens of Las Lágrimas. The long-abandoned estate lies deep in the Pampas, the vast empty grasslands of South America where the wind blows without end. Despite warnings from the locals of terrible things that once happened there and the evil that lingers, Ursula sets out to her new post full of hope. Yet when she arrives, all is not as promised. The garden is an untameable wilderness, the staff hostile. Setting to work, Ursula is disturbed by the crunch of footsteps on empty gravel paths, while from the nearby forest comes the frenzied chop of an axe when no one is there. But it is only as she unlocks the secrets of the place that Ursula comes to understand the true horror she is facing. For lurking in the trees - watching her, waiting for her - is a malevolent force that wants Las Lágrimas for itself.

W.M. Cleese is the pen name of a bestselling thriller writer. He studied literature at London University before moving to Brazil from where he travelled widely across South America, including Argentina. At an estancia in the Pampas he was told a curious tale about the planting of a forest that he never forgot and which became the basis for The Haunting of Las Lagrimas. He currently lives in rural East Anglia, near Anningley Hall, setting of 'The Mezzotint', his favourite M.R. James ghost story. Twitter: @wm_cleeseInstagram: wm.cleese