Henry has taken a position as a Doctor in a Manor in a remote Welsh village, and upon arrival it appears the whole story has not been revealed to him

The nature of the job is more than he expected and the locals also do not see him in a favourable light

It also transpires that Henry's predessor met his end under mysterious circumstances and the Lady of the Manor may be able to reveal some secrets through occult investigations

Gothic atmosphere, with secrets, twists and turns but something about this book just didn't quite grip me in the way I had hoped.

A spooky, creepy gothic story based in 18th century Wales, steeped in folklore and mystical texts. It was quite slow to get going, but nonetheless enjoyable.

My thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley. This review was written voluntarily and is entirely my own unbiased opinion.

Very haunting and creepy, a typical Susan Stokes-Chapman book. Living in Wales, I love an inclusion of Welsh Myth done well which is very present in this book!

Started off slow but then really drew me in. A chilling and creepy tale filled with richly drawn characters.

Very haunting and creepy and I got totally drawn up in this story. It was eerie and unsettling to read but I really enjoyed this sense of atmosphere and would like to read more by this author. A recommendation from me!

This was such an enjoyable book.

It was a bit slow to start but once it gets going it really keeps you engrossed.

I enjoyed the dark gothic aspects of the story and found the character building really well done.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House UK for providing me with this arc

A very enjoyable book. I didn't have great expectations at the start but it gathered momentum and the story developed very nicely in unexpected ways. Certainly a different basis for a story.
I enjoyed it and will look out for other titles by this author.

Really enjoyed this book it was gloriously gothic and the prose was beautiful- Susan Stokes-Chapman makes you feel very unsettled with the eeriness of this tale. The Welsh Mythology was so welcomed by me and I love it when a book reminds me of other stories and lore I dipped in and out of the Mabinogion while I was reading this book.
I did feel that there were areas in the book where I felt the pace was slightly off and that's why it wasn't a 5 star for me other than that I had a great time with this book.

A Gothic historical mystery that I wanted to like more than I did, and I'm still not quite sure why. Definitely a little too long and perhaps all just a bit too much everything!

It's 1783 and Henry Talbot is the new doctor in a village in rural Wales. He doesn't speak the language and the locals all believe in magic and the mythical and are quite hostile towards him. He finds out that the doctor before him died in mysterious circumstances and starts to wonder about the place he has found himself. This only intensifies when he meets the Lady of the manor an delves into the village history and people.

I think for me this veered too much into the mythical fantasy area than gothic historical fiction. I'm sure others will love it but not one for me.

4.5 stars

Deliciously dark, atmospheric, and brimful of folklore, magic and myth, this Gothic thriller held me spellbound from start to finish. The setting, deep in late-18th century, rural Wales couldn’t have been more evocative, the mystery more intriguing, the broad panoply of characters more skillfully drawn. I adored every word of it.

The Shadow Key is the story of disgraced doctor Henry Talbot, who lacking any choice, takes up the position of personal physician to the Tresilian family at their country manor, Plas Helyg, in the mining village of Penhelyg. As an ‘incomer’ and Englishman, Henry is treated by the locals with suspicion and outright malevolence, and when he discovers that his predecessor was likely poisoned, he very quickly finds himself enmeshed in a murky, underworld web of secrets, gross deception and black magic.

From the beginning, everything about Plas Helyg and its inhabitants appears off kilter, from its unconventional mistress, Linette, to her mad mother, overbearing cousin, and taciturn household staff. But as Henry’s suspicions grow, amid further evidence of misdeeds, he finds an ally in Linette, and together they determine to uncover the truth.

I loved the creepy, cloying atmosphere of this story; the steadily building sense of dark forces at work. It’s a sinister, twisty unraveling, with Stoke-Chapman revealing her hand with tantalizing slowness. And in the way of all great prestidigitators, she keeps her best cards until last, eventually slapping them down, one by one, with a stunning volley of flourishes, each more dramatic than the last.

I’ll confess, I had no idea where this story was going. But the not knowing was part of the book’s hypnotic power. All the while, my mind was casting around for explanations, and while I did pick up on a couple of clues, I was wholly unprepared for the shocking denouement and the secrets it revealed.

A new author for me, but one I shall be following with keen interest.

Congratulations! Your review for The Shadow Key, captioned below,
has been published. Visit
<https://freshfiction.com/review.php?id=87913> to view your
published review.

Please share your review via Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest,
Instagram and other social media venues. Include the #FFreview
hashtag or @FreshFiction in your posts.

In my opinion, Stokes-Chapman’s greatest success here in ‘The Shadow Key’ lies in creating atmosphere:
'The smell of sulphur catches in his throat and as the old man coughs he sees his breath pool in the air before him.'

Susan Stokes-Chapman’s technical skill deserves to be spotlit in any review. The atmosphere in this novel is what perhaps books like ‘The Whistling’ by Rebecca Nettley aim for and maybe just miss by an inch, and what the likes of ‘Mistletoe’ by Allison Littlewood have bullseye’d: this gorgeous showing-not-telling push-and-pull build of suspense.

Stokes-Chapman selects her linguistic tools and fashions tension through her use of repetition to underscore the Henry’s fixations, helicoptering his unease a bit like a villanelle would. She alternates long rambling paragraphs with short, abrupt sentences (often comprising a single word: 'Whispering.'; 'Yet.'; 'Gone.'; 'He sees nothing'). I also admire her use of place-as-character. And none of the seams show in the finished garment; the atmosphere all reads fluently, naturalistically.

And talking about atmosphere, what can we say about that cover?! I was sold immediately (I have to confess that I still haven’t got around to reading ‘Pandora’, even though I bought it as soon as it came out, solely on the strength of its own gorgeous cover – I had to have it).

But atmosphere will only ever take me so far. Ultimately, ‘The Skeleton Key’ left me disappointed and frustrated. It’s long after the halfway point before Stokes-Chapman issues readers with any semblance of plot. Inexcusable, in my view, and I wouldn’t have persevered with this had it not been a NetGalley ARC.

It’s so late in the novel when the title actually clicks into place, that the anticlimax of the mystery-reveal as to what ‘The Skeleton Key’ means, or what it is, comes to symbolise the entire reading experience.

In actual fact, it’s not until 80% that Stokes-Chapman's novel proper begins. I know it’s a brutal declaration, but I'd say this book could have the first 70% excised and it’d be improved by it. Perhaps it should have been a novella? Although I can't see how the story would have worked in that case. Perhaps this suggests that, in actual fact, the whole undertaking might have needed a total overhaul in editing. The way everything suddenly rushes in in the last pages of the book just undermines, for me, the very substance of that final bit of action.

Thanks to Random House UK Vintage for the advanced digital copy in exchange for review.

3.5 stars rounded to 4 stars

This was such an interesting read. A Gothic historical mystery set in rural Wales with a sprinkling of magic, mythology & Welsh Folklore.
I did find this a very slow burn to begin with but once the story picked up pace I was hooked however I did find the ending a bit lack luster but overall a very enjoyable & interesting read.

Stokes-Chapman’s novel immerses readers in 18th-century Wales with a captivating gothic and fantastical tone. The slow pace builds anticipation, leading to a significant payoff. While the setting, characters, and historical elements, including the use of Welsh language, are well-crafted and engaging, the final twists did not leave a lasting impression on me. The book is well-executed, but it ultimately didn’t resonate as strongly as I had hoped.

This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and I would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

While this book had good creepy vibes throughout, I felt that more could have been done with the narrative and when the big plot reveal comes, it feels like a bit of an anticlimax. What the novel is most of all is a lovesong to Wales, which makes sense given it's the author's chosen home. Readers of gothic fiction should enjoy this.

I enjoyed reading this book very much. It was very well written and the descriptions were beautifully done. The Story line was interesting yet different and kept me reading avidly throughout. I would definitely recommend this book to fans of historical fiction and also gothic horror fans.

A gothic historical mystery that pays homage to the classics and made me travel to place full of legends, myths, and occult.
A well plotted and intriguing story
A more extensive review will follow
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

It is the 18th century and disgraced surgeon Henry Talbot arrives from London in rural Wales following an out-of-the-blue approach from a wealthy aristocrat and mine owner. What ensues is a dark, gothic mystery with Henry and Linette, the aristrocrat's independent-minded neice, at its centre. Some very good scene setting, descriptions and characterisations. The ending, although dramatic, was a slight anticlimax for me as it felt far-fetched and largely predicatable, hence the three star raiting, although some melodramatic twists came as a surprise.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advance reader copy of this novel.

Stokes-Chapman has a beautiful and intriguing way with words that really plummets you into the environment of 18th century Wales, but with a gothic and fantastical tone.
It is very slow paced, but it builds up to something big so the reward, I guess, is there.
I do have to say that I think the book is good--it's just not for me. Whilst I enjoyed the setting and the characters, and loved the development of both as well as the historical and cultural elements, including the love that was put into including the Welsh language, and the plot was decent too, but I did not find that I was overall impressed with the "twists" that came towards the end.
I do really have to commend Stokes-Chapman on her representation of Wales and the way that she writes characters--those were the best things in the book, and I felt the realness of the protagonists which is something that does not often happen for me. It actually did feel like a piece of history came alive in that book, which is an incredible feat.

With thanks to Netgalley, Random House UK, and the author for the ARC.

After Henry is accused of killing one of his patients at the London hospital where he works, he finds it impossible to find an alternative position, until he receives an offer to work as the family doctor for the Tresilian family in the remote Welsh village of Penhelyg. It isn't too long, however, before Henry begins questioning whether all is as it seems in the village, where English outsiders are unwelcome and questions are raised about how his predecessor died. This story had an excellent touch of Victorian gothic to it. I wasn't sure about the references to the occult or magic initially as these aren't things I'm particularly interested in, but in the context of the story they did make sense. Overall I thought this was a great mystery, with a real sense of place and time, and I am very grateful to NetGalley for giving me the chance to read it in exchange for an honest review.