Sulevia, named after the ancient Celtic goddess, is spending the summer on an archaeological project in the wilds of Northumberland to recreate Bronze Age life. Her father is an amateur history nut and her mother seems willing to go along with the project.

So Sylvie (as she calls herself) finds herself finds herself in a field, sleeping in a tent, foraging for food and wearing scratchy tunics. She’s not happy, but she’s also not rebelling. Her family seem to be the only genuine volunteers on the project; the others – the professor and his undergraduate students – are there because the university requires it. While Sylvie’s father demands absolute adherence to authenticity, the others are rather more open to persuasion. After all, the Bronze Age people made up for their lack of modern technology through proficiency in what they did have; and who could swear that the Bronze Age communities did not have mod cons?

The story that unfolds is one of the relationship between Sylvie and her domineering father, determined to impose a value system from a bygone age on his family. Sylvie’s father demands fidelity even when the Professor is advocating a more flexible approach. And where the community does not comply with his vision, there is a price to be paid.

The story is written as an English nationalist hearkening back to a bygone age when Britons were free and pure. But there are obvious parallels with extreme adherents to world religions, demanding that the rest of the world fit in with their anachronistic belief systems. The family’s reluctance to challenge the force of the father – their willingness to embrace the privations in order to give themselves the illusion of free choice – is surely more about the modern world than it was ever about Celtic Britain. The temptations of the Seven Eleven – ice creams and hot pies – are the temptations of the West trying to seduce the faithful away from the path of virtue.

Ghost Wall is a short, very readable novel that grows in intensity with every page. Yes, the metaphors are there front and centre, but they do not take away from the very human dynamic between Sylvie, her mother and her father – three complex characters who do not neatly fit into predictable stereotypes.

This novel may be slim, but it packs a real punch. ‘Ghost Wall’ may evoke impressions of an atmospheric, spooky tale, but it’s an unflinching portrait of the oppression wrought by an abusive parent (even when the surface of the abuse is barely scratched). The evocation of the landscape only adds to the tense claustrophobia.

Silvie and her parents join an archaeology professor and three of his students on a field trip to Northumberland. The trip is an experiment in "experiential archaeology" in the sense that its participants try to recreate and re-enact the living conditions of the Iron Age tribes which inhabited these remote areas. The professor's intentions are innocent enough, at least at the outset - a mixture of academic curiosity and a "Boys' Own" thirst for adventure which he seems to share with his students. Silvie's dad, on the other hand, has darker motives. We soon learn that he has supremacist fantasies about "Ancient Britons", whom he considers a pure, home-grown race, untainted by foreign influences. He idolises their way of life which, albeit nasty, brutish and short, is for him a test of manly mettle. And he has a morbid fascination with the Bog People, probably Iron Age victims of human sacrifice.

At first the group dynamics make the novel feel like an episode of "Celebrity Survivors" as we feel the increasing friction between the disparate characters. However, things take a turn for the sinister when the men decide to build a "ghost wall" - a wooden barricade topped by animal skulls which the ancients apparently used as a means of psychological warfare against invading hordes.

Ghost Wall is a slender novella which packs a punch. The narrative element is tautly controlled. There's a constant sense of dread, of violence simmering beneath the surface. These leads to a terrifying climax, in which the novel skirts the folk horror genre to chilling effect.

More importantly, however, the work is a timely indictment of patriarchal and racist prejudices which, though distinct, often fuel each other. It also seems to suggest that even monsters have redeeming features which endear them to their own victims, whilst seemingly innocent persons can commit grave acts when they give in to atavistic instincts. Perhaps what make this novel so disturbing is that these horrors are all too real.

You may be familiar with those colourful historical re-enactment days put on by devotees of a certain time or place – perhaps the English Civil War, or the American War of Independence, or maybe life in a medieval village. In ‘Ghost Wall’ Sarah Moss tells the story of historical enthusiasm taken much further. Teenager Silvie (an abbreviation of Sulevia, the Northumbrian goddess of springs and pools), named out of her father’s passion for Ancient British life – a lifestyle that particularly appeals to the brute in him - finds herself camping out ‘Ancient style’ with her bullying father and subservient mother who have joined Professor Slade and three archaeology undergraduates. (Her father is recognised as a self-taught expert on the period.)
Soon it is clear that Silvie and her mother live in terror of their father/husband. He is cruel in every way possible, viewing women as chattels, scorning his daughter’s opinions and despising his wife. A successful day is a day when he hasn’t been annoyed by them and those days rarely happen. Over the course of the novel, verbal abuse aside, Silvie’s mother is bruised by his rough handling whilst Silvie is whipped savagely because she is caught bathing in a stream. Abuse in their household is clearly commonplace. The only person to seriously question his behaviour is Molly, one of the three students, and she is the person in whom Silvie confides when the full horror of her father’s re-enactment plans are revealed.
This is a wonderful novel. Sarah Moss creates really credible characters. It is very moving to read of the ways in which Silvie tries to stay true to her curious, sociable self, whilst gradually being ground down by her very scary and manipulative father. Equally we feel sympathy for Alison, his wife, whose daily mission it is not to be ‘annoying’. She has become nothing more than a servant shadow and it’s very easy to understand why. Silvie’s father is a monster. Whilst there are hints at why he may be such a sadistic megalomaniac – his wife’s excuse is that he is frustrated by his lack of formal education - it’s clear that his nationalistic fervour and misogynistic ways are unchallenged in his household, creating a toxic blend of fear and hopelessness.
‘Ghost Wall’ reminds us that perfectly intelligent and capable people can be worn down by abuse to become a shadow of their former selves. In tandem with this central theme, Sarah Moss also weaves in details about Ancient Britain very vividly and powerfully. The opening scene allows us to appreciate just how pitiless some of their rituals were and the narrative throughout reminds us that the uncivilised does not lurk too far beneath the surface now. But it is not all darkness. Molly has learnt from her mother that it’s important to stand up to injustice and prejudice and she will not be cowed. This is a novel most apt for the times in which we live.
My thanks to NetGalley and Granta Publications for a copy of this book in exchange for a fair review.

The setting of this novel is breathtaking. Moss successfully captures the feel of the Northumberland wood - heat, water, pain - until the landscape is more of a presence in the book than some of the actual characters. The relationships are sketched out beautifully too: the slow unfurling thread between Molly and Sylvie is shown rather than told, as are Sylvie's complex relationships with her abusive father and depressed, apathetic mother.

Unfortunately, the book falls flat in a couple of areas. We're promised a 'terrifying climax' with a bog girl in 'terrifying proximity'; said bog girl is hinted at in the prologue and never mentioned again, while the so-called climax appears suddenly 90% of the way through, making it too much out of left field to mesh organically with the story arc as a whole. It also requires a bit too much suspension of disbelief for my liking. Most of the characters could do with a lot more fleshing out, as well.

On the whole a 3-star read; while tension and drama are a bit lacking, relationships and the location are superbly tackled.

Ghost Wall is a subtle and unnerving novel about a girl forced into a summer of experimental archeology by her abusive father. Sylvie is seventeen and is spending her summer at a recreated Iron Age camp in Northumbria, as her father—who is obsessed with recreating the hardship of Iron Age life—works with an archeology professor and some students to live like people might have in the past. Sylvie and her mother live in the shadow of her father and his anger and rules, but in the heat of the summer and the bare landscape near Hadrian's Wall, his beliefs might be turned into something else, something inspired by the bog girls who were forced into sacrifice many years ago.

This is a short novel that creates a strange and tense atmosphere through description and detail. Sylvie's life is depicted through her perspective of the events at the camp and how she knows about foraging and survival, in contrast to the three students who are on the trip. Moss weaves in tensions around misogyny and class to the narrative, which is centred around abuse by those closest to you. At the same time, it is about Sylvie being aware that there is more to life that what her father is trying to force her to be, hints of coming of age with the backdrop of an unusual and difficult childhood.

Ghost Wall is a compact novel that tells a small story featuring a small cast of characters staying in a camp in the wilderness. It also spans many hundreds of years, telling a story of force and coercion that hasn't changed much. Its structure—short and descriptive with a sudden conclusion—might not appeal to everyone, but this is one for people who are interested in trying to know the past, but also depict a more modern day experience in fiction.