"A mystery and an elegy for the death of old-fashioned journalism, it's
a book that will warm your heart." The Observer
"Splendid . . . Funny, poignant, perceptive and plenty of sharp elbows
along the way." Val McDermid
Thorn Marsh was raised in a house of whispers, of meaningful glances and
half- finished sentences. Now she's a journalist with a passion for
truth, more devoted to her work at the London Journal than she ever was
to her ex-husband.
When the newspaper is bought by media giant The Goring Group, who value
sales figures over fact-checking, Thorn openly questions their methods,
and promptly finds herself moved from the news desk to the midweek
supplement, reporting heart-warming stories for their new segment, The
Bright Side, a job to which she is spectacularly unsuited.
On a final warning and with no heart-warming news in sight, a desperate
Thorn fabricates a good-news story of her own. The story, centred on an
angelic apparition on Hampstead Heath, goes viral. Caught between her
principles and her ambitions, Thorn goes in search of the truth behind
her creation, only to find the answers locked away in the unconscious
mind of a stranger.
Marika Cobbold returns with her eighth novel, On Hampstead Heath. Sharp,
poignant, and infused with dark humour, On Hampstead Heath is an homage
to storytelling and to truth; to the tales we tell ourselves, and the
stories that save us.
