Crow Face, Doll Face

'Beautifully written, tender and terrifying.' UNA MANNION Annie surrendered her fantasy of travelling the world, settled instead for marrying her beloved Peter and becoming a mother. When her two youngest daughters - her Crow Face and her Doll Face - perform a seemingly impossible act of levitation at a family picnic, Annie realises that they are truly extraordinary. Magical. And it's her role to protect them. With growing paranoia and a bitter fatalism, she spirits her daughters away from their home and the wreck of her marriage. But she commits a terrible, unthinkable, unmotherly act on the way. Crow Face, Doll Face is an uncanny, brooding tale of domestic disturbances, dysfunctional families, flawed mothers, and unfulfilled dreams. 'I can't think of anyone who's currently writing more assuredly, or more enjoyably, in the fantastical tradition of Angela Carter, Emma Tennant and Elizabeth Bowen.' STEVE DUFFY 'Deliciously unsettling... delicately peels away the layers of ordinary family life to reveal dark truths underneath.' CATRIN KEAN 'Unflinching in its authentic and raw portrayal of the complexities of motherhood.' PHILIPPA HOLLOWAY

Carly Holmes lives and writes on the banks of the river Teifi, west Wales. Her debut novel The Scrapbook was shortlisted for the International Rubery Book Award, and her Literary Strange short story collection Figurehead was published in limited edition hardback by Tartarus Press, and reprinted in paperback by Parthian Books. Her prize-winning short prose has appeared in journals and anthologies such as Ambit, The Ghastling, The Lonely Crowd, and has twice been selected for The Best Horror of the Year.