'Basically what we have here is a dreamer. Somebody out of touch with reality. When she jumped, she probably thought she'd fly'

The Cat Sanctuary Paperback

The Cat Sanctuary

Patrick Gale

Judith and Deborah are sisters driven apart by traumatic events in their childhood, but thrown back together again when Deborah’s diplomat husband is accidentally assassinated. Judith’s lover, Joanna, the instigator of this awkward reunion, finds that as the sisters’ murky past is raked up, so too is her own, and the three women become embroiled in a tangle of passion and recrimination.

Reviews of The Cat Sanctuary

  • ‘Splendidly realised Cornish moorland setting, wellies, ruts, dripping sheep…Gale’s specialist forte being pathos into bathos, tears of desolation leaking into the gravy, but he writes about the difficult emotions with delicacy, perception and a rare ferocious charm’ Guardian

    ‘“The Cat Sanctuary” is a book with claws. It has a soft surface – a story set in sloping Cornish countryside, touching on love, families and forgiveness, delivered in a gentle, straightforward prose – but from time to time it catches you unawares. Scratch the surface, suggests Gale, and you draw blood’ The Times

    ‘Gale’s writing is marvellously entertaining, and there is a compelling sense of biting deep into the core of the bitter truth’ Cosmopolitan

    ‘Like Gale’s previous novels, it’s an elegantly menacing, enjoyable read that starts as it means to go on – dynamically. “The Cat Sanctuary” presents people’s lives and coiled springs, wound tighter and tighter until suddenly they unleash themselves on their nearest and dearest…It’s a deep and moving book; highly recommended’ New Woman

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