Summer 1981 At a party held in the garden of a beautiful chateau in the village of Canas, in southern France, a young man takes his life. In doing so he seeks to bury a terrible family legacy, unleashed in the aftermath of WWII; but his suicide breaks his family apart. Winter 2010 Kate and Stephen Glover, a young London couple, arrive in Canas for a much needed sabbatical. Kate, seeking escape from her marriage, is irrevocably drawn to the village and to the derelict chateau at its heart. What she cannot know is that her interest in the chateau will reawaken old ghosts, forcing the family who once lived there finally to reunite and confront the tragedy of the past...Moving between the postwar years and the present day, We All Ran into the Sunlight is a heartbreaking story of love, misplaced desire and the damage done when the truth is withheld.

The past grabs hold and will not let you go in this uncanny and beautiful novel. Strange and delicious in the manner of Rebecca. Sarah Blake, author of The Postmistress Poised, well-written, richly detailed. - Ben Okri We All Ran Into the Sunlight is the sort of intricate invention that only a few masters - like Ian McEwan or Graham Greene - could assemble. This novel will mesmerize you - and it will break your heart. Stefan Merrill Block, author of The Story of Forgetting Bold and original... Natalie Young captures beautifully the character of a small French town, porous to every drop of gossip but presenting an impenetrable surface to outsiders. Helen Dunmore Natalie Young has created a near-Gothic story of obsession and desire, set against the background of a sinister chateau. Definitely not for the faint-hearted... A true tour de force. Mavis Cheek

Natalie Young worked for The Times for several years. She has two children and lives in London. This is her first novel.