In the spring of 1936, horror writer H.P. Lovecraft is broke, living alone in a creaky old house and deathly ill. At the edge of a nervous breakdown, he hires a personal assistant, Arthor Crandle. As the novel opens, Crandle arrives at Lovecraft's home with no knowledge of the writer or his work but is soon drawn into his distinctly unnerving world: the malevolent presence that hovers on the landing; the ever-shining light from Lovecraft's study, invisible from the street; and visions in the night of a white-clad girl in the walled garden. Add to this the arrival of a beautiful woman who may not be exactly what she seems, and Crandle is pulled deeper into the strange world of H.P. Lovecraft (a man known to Crandle only through letters, signed "Ech-Pi"), until Crandle begins to unravel the dark secret at its heart.
A brilliantly written, compelling and deeply creepy novel, The Broken Hours is an irresistible literary ghost story.

Jacqueline Baker is the author of A Hard Witching And Other Stories, which won the Danuta Gleed Literary Award, the City of Edmonton Book Prize and the Howard O’Hagan Award for Short Fiction. It was also a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Raised in southwestern Saskatchewan, Jacqueline Baker has been the writer-in-residence at Grant MacEwan College in Edmonton and teaches at the Banff Centre for the Arts. She lives with her husband and two daughters in British Columbia.

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“Deliciously creepy, heartbreaking and beautiful.”

Esi Edugyan, author of the Giller Prize-winning novel <em>Half-Blood Blues</em>

“Baker’s prose is absolutely magical.”

Rue Morgue

“A powerful read, creepy to the point of terrifying and, at times, utterly heartbreaking, graced with both a compelling narrative and a deep, thoughtful substrata.”

Vancouver Sun

“It is a perfectly ghastly tale and Baker achieves the double task of mirroring Lovecraft’s own story.”

Toronto Star

“A sleek, stylish ghost story.”

Edmonton Journal

“Baker’s characterization is strong, her prose evocative, and the ambiance she creates as creepy as a frigid draft that blows a door shut in an empty house. The pacing is superb.”

Historical Novels Review