The Novice of Holloway Hall

The Novice of Holloway Hall

Wayne Johnston

#8044 of 8,085 books · #1074 in Historical Fiction

Longlisted for the Giller Prize (2026).

The Novice of Holloway Hall was longlisted for the 2026 Giller Prize. At twenty-eight, Vivvy Holloway is nearly the same height as when she was five. Though she hides her face behind a veil, a different colour and fabric for each day of the week, she brandishes an acerbic wit that far outweighs her small stature. Having just spent eight years of the 1930s in a convent failing to become a nun, Vivvy is now returning to Holloway Hall, the largest private dwelling in Newfoundland and the crumbling seat of her formidable family. Vivvy's sister Freda, a doctor, now rules the estate and its fortune. She is also its sole occupant, save for the five-year-old "special member of the family" known as Ivan, who came home with Freda after her failed marriage in the Congo, where she and her husband were missionaries until tragedy struck. Tasked with caring for the boy while Freda works long shifts—and displays increasingly erratic behaviour—Vivvy begins to suspect that something is dangerously amiss in Holloway Hall. Over the course of a single turbulent week, Vivvy faces off against her domineering sister, her ten cleric brothers, and a host of meddling hangers-on, unearthing long-buried secrets that threaten not only her and Ivan's place in the family, but the fate of the entire Holloway name.