Daughter of the Northern Fields

the long version

**Christabel Woodward is the darling of her prosperous, mill-owning father until one day he has a sudden and bewildering change of heart. He has read her mother's story, written in three exercise books and usually kept well hidden, and he knows her secret: Christabel is not his own child, but the illegitimate daughter of Branwell Bronte.** **Branwell died at thirty-one,** an obsessive and tormented wreck of a man who was ruined by drinking, drug addiction and bouts of depression. All Christabel's mother has left of her secret love are a lock of auburn hair and Branwell's daughter, whom he has never known. ***First published in 1987, Daughter of the Northern Fields is Christabel's story.*** It is the story of a girl who loses all those whom she loves most dearly and is forced to leave the wild Yorkshire moorland which is her home. **A girl who is abused by a shattering rape which leaves her feeling she can never again love or be loved. But Christabel is destined to experience a joy that she had not dared to believe possible.** In this impressive novel Pamela Haines brilliantly captures the atmosphere of the **Brontes' Yorkshire.** With her courage, her indomitable spirit and her depth of feeling, ***Christabel is a creation worthy of the pages of a Bronte novel.***