A Treason of Thorns

Violet Helena Sterling lives in an England where the well-being of the land depends on the Great Houses, centuries-old magical, sentient places whose powers are managed by faithful Caretakers. Each Great House's powers can be deadly if not channeled through the right source, the house's key, and can be used to keep the countryside surrounding a Great House in prosperity. Each House, however, is also bound to serve the King, their magnificent power shackled to the whims of their master, and the Houses are also bound to destroy anyone who tries to free them. Their deeds are hidden from even their caretakers lest treason tempt them to free the houses and allow their magic to manifest itself in its fullness.

Violet's father, George Sterling, is one such caretaker of Burleigh House. Burleigh keeps the West Country prosperous, and the Sterlings have served Burleigh for centuries. George's conscience and loyalty to Burleign overpower his duty to the king. He knows that Burleigh is old and dying and needs its full power back to heal itself. By searching for the house's deed, George Sterling commits treason, and, as a result, he is placed under house arrest by the king, along with Wyn, Violet's childhood friend, and he is never to leave Burleigh's gates unless he is carried out as a corpse.

The novel's prologue, from which the excerpt above is taken, speaks of Burleigh shortly before Violet's father's treason. Violet's mother has already left them and is about to be happily remarried in Switzerland, leaving Violet temporarily desolate. Weymouth then moves the narrative's action seven years forward to when George Sterling finally dies under house arrest.

Violet is summoned by the king to return to Burleigh from the Fens where she and her servants, Jed and Mira, were living in exile. The king, who also happens to be Violet’s godfather, is a slippery type who smiles and smiles and is a villain. He challenges Violet, giving her just one summer to restore the house or else see it be burned to the ground. There's always a catch with offers like this, though--Violet must restore Burleigh without its key, guaranteeing her death through mortar poisoning, the same mortar that is already seeping through the countryside from the failing Burleigh.

Violet has no recourse but to rise to this impossible challenge. Stubborn to a fault, her spirit and pluck are as admirable as her unswerving devotion to Burleigh. That devotion is tested because of her childhood friend Wyn, who was brought to Burleigh by her father as a young boy from a foundling's home. Surly and grown-up now, he continues to ask Violet to leave Burleigh and begin anew. Wyn was the one person who always made Violet feel anchored to safety as a child, besides Burleigh itself, and it's no surprise that romantic feelings develop between them. It's also no surprise that Violet's loyalty to Burleigh stands in their love's way. Violet is determined to find Burleigh's deed in order to free it from the king and restore it to its former glory. To Violet's horror, however, she discovers that her father brought Wyn to the house not as her companion, but as a replacement for herself. This is because Burleigh loved Violet so much that it wanted her fate bound to its own. Wyn confesses to Violet that George Sterling bound Wyn to the house to spare Violet from having to sacrifice her own life for Burleigh.

Burleigh is a silent but dynamic character in the story whose suffering is channeled through Violet's empathy toward it. It has vestiges of its former glory and majesty, barring outsiders with a brier of thorns from entering, but bestowing favour on Violet by allowing fragrant blooms or tendrils ivy to surround her or by lighting hearth fires to keep her warm. It's not an easy feat for an author to pull off, but Weymouth does so for the most part. A fair amount of the story exists in flashbacks as Violet tries to find Burleigh's deed by asking the house to relive its memories for her, and she scours her father's documents to see where he has traveled in his search for the house's deed.

Neither is Violet alone in her quest as the king's own daughter, Esperanza, perhaps even more spirited and plucky than Violet, and her husband, a scholar of magical houses across Europe, become Violet's allies. Esperanza's own quest is to free all the houses before she ascends to the throne, herself, to avoid altogether the temptation to keep the Great Houses in servitude. Violet discovers that the there is no paper deed to the house, but that what the king holds over Burleigh, and each Great House, is a piece of itself, its heartstone, which each house pines for and feels incomplete without. Violet locates it in a cold, desolate cave in Cornwall, but returns to Burleigh to discover that the king has sent the Duke of Falmouth to Burleigh to claim it and burn it down. When Wyn is possessed by Burleigh and rebukes Violet for her divided heart, she has to make the ultimate choice between duty and love.

A Treason of Thorns is told with nuance, delicate but deft world-building, and charged with emotion. Lushly atmospheric, its romance between two seemingly doomed lovers, and Burleigh as a gloomy third, makes for an unusual but compelling love triangle. A Treason of Thorns is ultimately about a story of a girl who has to choose between who she's told she ought to be, and who she knows she's become, and Weymouth does not disappoint readers in the novel's resolution. I also want to give bonus points to Weymouth for weaving in details of Jed and Mira's Jewish faith as a cultural contrast to Violet's own upbringing. One hopes for more instalments to see if Violet and her friends succeed in releasing the other Great Houses, but, as a standalone, A Treason of Thorns has more than enough to satisfy young readers with its fully realised alternate England, emotional honesty, and characters who are easy to root for.