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Hartlepool Hall has been in Ed's family for generations - but is that about to change, and who is the mysterious Lady Alice From the bestselling author of Salmon Fishing in the Yemen comes a story of inheritance, a great country house, and a way of life that is disappearing.Ed Hartlepool has been living in self-imposed exile for five years, but with a settlement regarding his inheritance looming, he must return to his ancestral seat, Hartlepool Hall. On his return, he discovers that his father has left him, along with the house, a seven million pound tax bill, two massive overdrafts, an 80-year-old butler, and a vast country estate that is creaking at the seams. Not only that, but there is a strange woman in residence - Lady Alice - who seems to have made herself very much at home. With the debts mounting, it seems that Ed's only recourse is to turn to his friend Annabel's new boyfriend, a property developer who plans to turn Hartlepool Hall into luxury flats and a golf course. But can Ed save his inheritance without such a drastic move And is Lady Alice really the person she claims to be. About the Author Paul Torday was born in 1946 and read English Literature at Pembroke College, Oxford. He spent the next 30 years working in engineering and in industry, after which he scaled back his business responsibilities to fulfil a long-harboured ambition - to write. He burst on to the literary scene in 2006 with his first novel, SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN, an immediate bestseller that has been sold in 25 countries. He is married with two sons by a previous marriage and has two stepsons and lives close to the River North Tyne.