The Cloisters : The Secret History for a new generation – an instant Sunday Times bestseller

【Product Information】

Ann Stilwell arrives in New York City, hoping to spend her summer working at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Instead, she is assigned to The Cloisters, a gothic museum and garden renowned for its collection of medieval and Renaissance art.

Drawn into a small circle of charismatic but enigmatic researchers, Ann happy to indulge some of their more outlandish theories, including the museum’s curator who is fixated on tarot and the real possibility of predicting the future.

But when Ann discovers a mysterious, once-thought lost deck of 15th-century Italian tarot cards she finds herself at the centre of a dangerous game of power, toxic friendship and ambition.

And as the game being played within the Cloisters spirals out of control, Ann must decide who she trusts . . .

The instant Sunday Times bestseller, January 2023

【Author Information】

Katy Hays

A writer and adjunct Art History professor in California, where she teaches rural students from Truckee to Tecopa. She holds an MA in Art History from Williams College and pursued her PhD at UC Berkeley. Having worked in curatorial and research roles at major art institutions, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and The Clark Art Institute, Katy brings an insider’s knowledge of the workings of museums and galleries as well as in-depth research into the fascinating history of fortune-telling to The Cloisters, her first novel. She lives with her husband and dog, Queso, in Olympic Valley.

【Media’s Review】

Beguiling and atmospheric, an entrancing and gripping tale. — KATE MOSSE, author of Labyrinth

Elegant and atmospheric and suffused with brooding menace, The Cloisters transports us to the dark corridors of museum life, embroiling the reader in a twisting mystery, while also intelligently exploring the nature of fate versus freewill. — LUCY CLARKE, author of The Castaways

Glamour, power, seduction, ambition – The Cloisters has it all. I adored this deliciously gothic, beautifully written novel. — LOUISE O’NEILL, author of Idol

This is a modern, Gothic masterpiece. Successfully linking modern critical thinking with the divinity of the past, and human nature’s desire to believe that there is something else out there. 9/10 ― INDEPENDENT

The dark and enigmatic world of The Cloisters captured me from the off . . . a story of academic obsession, Renaissance magic and the ruthless pursuit of power. Captivating in every sense. — SARAH PEARSE, author of The Sanatorium