The Manor of Dreams

At night, the garden comes alive... Mexican Gothic meets The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo in Christina Li's completely addictive and beautifully haunting gothic page-turner.

Vivian Yin is dead. The trailblazing starlet was the first Chinese actress to win an Oscar - but at what should have been the peak of her career, she became a recluse. The rest of her life was shrouded in mystery...

Now, her daughters gather for the reading of her will. They expect to inherit their childhood home: a grand Southern California manor house with a sprawling, labyrinthine garden. But due to a last-minute change to the will, the house is passed on to another family instead. The two families haven't seen each other for decades - not since the tragedy that fractured all of their lives.

Vying for the estate, both families move into the crumbling, vine-covered manor. As Vivian's daughters race to piece together what happened in the last weeks of their mother's life, they soon discover they are being haunted by something far more sinister and vengeful than just their memories.

After so many years of silence, will the families finally confront the truth behind the house's origins and the last, tragic summer they spent there? Or will the manor of dreams - and its deadly secrets - finally lay claim to its owners?

Praise for The Manor of Dreams:

'A true modern classic. The Manor of Dreams is beautiful, eerie, and woven with enough intrigue to hold all who enter captive. Christina Li remains unmatched in breathing characters to life - and the hauntings thereafter' Chloe Gong, New York Times bestselling author of Immortal Longings

'The Manor of Dreams peels back the promises of the American Dream to reveal something more painful, more heartbreaking, and ultimately, more true. An ambitious, evocative meditation on the hurts passed down across generations - and how we heal' Grace D. Li, New York Times bestselling author of Portrait of a Thief

'Richly imagined... Fans of Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic ought to take note of this beautiful and haunting novel' Publishers Weekly

'Packed with gothic plot, gushing blood, choking clods of dirt, and angry ghosts - a smorgasbord for devotees' Kirkus

'A bejewelled puzzle box to unlock' Shelf Awareness

'A lushly crafted haunted house gothic, full of family secrets and forbidden romance and grounded in Hollywood's long history of racism and patriarchy' CrimeReads

'A clever, unexpected, and lush ghost story. I curled u

Richly imagined... Fans of Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic ought to take note of this beautiful and haunting novel. Publishers Weekly
Packed with gothic plot, gushing blood, choking clods of dirt, and angry ghosts-a smorgasbord for devotees. Kirkus
The Manor of Dreams is a bejeweled puzzle box to unlock. Shelf Awareness
An atmospheric thriller that tackles what some people must pay for the great American dream. Reader’s Digest
A lushly crafted haunted house gothic, full of family secrets and forbidden romance and grounded in Hollywood's long history of racism and patriarchy. CrimeReads
A true modern classic. The Manor of Dreams is beautiful, eerie and woven with enough intrigue to hold all who enter captive. Christina Li remains unmatched in breathing characters to life - and the hauntings thereafter Chloe Gong, New York Times bestselling author of Immortal Longings
The Manor of Dreams peels back the promises of the American Dream to reveal something more painful, more heartbreaking, and ultimately, more true. An ambitious, evocative meditation on the hurts passed down across generations - and how we heal Grace D. Li, New York Times bestselling author of Portrait of a Thief
Christina Li has woven together the struggles of immigration, the complexities of mother-daughter relationships, the resentments between upstairs-downstairs "friends," and the glitz and disappointments of Hollywood to create a clever, unexpected, and lush ghost story. I curled up with The Manor of Dreams and read it over a single weekend. Lisa See, author of Lady Tan's Circle of Women and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
Haunting, tender, and intoxicating. Written with gorgeous prose and unforgettable characters, Li's gothic adult debut will leave you devastated until the very end, and then long after you've put the book down. Carolyn Huynh, author of The Fortunes of Jaded Women
You know that feeling when you watch the first episode of a streaming series and instantly know you're going to binge the whole thing? That's exactly how you'll feel after reading the first chapter of this book. A part of you-a very delighted part-will immediately think, "Cancel all my plans; I'm devouring this in one sitting." And that's exactly what I did. Deliciously eerie, culturally vibrant, and historically profound-The Manor of Dreams is a dark pleasure. Jamie Ford, author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Christina Li is the award-winning author of children's books Clues to the Universe, which was a Washington Post summer book club pick, and Ruby Lost and Found, which was an NPR and New York Public Library Best Book of the Year and recognised for the Asian Pacific American Librarians' Award for Best Children's Literature. She is also the author of YA title True Love and Other Impossible Odds. She graduated from Stanford University with degrees in Economics and Public Policy. She grew up in the Midwest and California but now calls New York home. The Manor of Dreams is her adult debut.

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