Jake Arnott is an award-winning novelist and dramatist whose bestselling debut The Long Firm was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and was adapted as a BAFTA award-winning BBC TV drama series starring Mark Strong and Sir Derek Jacobi. His second novel, He Kills Coppers was made into a critically acclaimed ITV1 series, starring Rafe Spall and Kelly Reilly. Along with his third book, truecrime, this trilogy was awarded the Crime Writers Association Dagger in the Library. His subsequent novels include Johnny Come Home, The Devil’s Paintbrush, The House of Rumour and The Fatal Tree.
His new novel, Netherwood will be available in August 2026. Pre-order here:
“A masterclass of British horror”
– David Barnett, author of Withered Hill
After personal trauma and professional failure in London, Justine and Adam move to Hastings, hoping that the charming fisherman’s cottage overlooking the sea will be the perfect place to make a new life together. But their new home holds many secrets, including a cave at the back of it, and a witch bottle said to ward off bad spirits. Soon, they discover a dark history that haunts this seaside town.
Former occupant of their house, John Malachy, was an occult celebrity at the height of the Sixties counterculture, obsessed with macabre rituals and chaos magic that led to shocking scandal and his mysterious suicide. Strange events escalate, Justine becomes haunted by the ghost of a young girl, Adam enchanted by an unearthly creature, and they begin to learn of something terrible that Malachy once enacted in the cave.
It all leads back to the notorious Aleister Crowley – the Great Beast – whose death in Hastings years before unleashed a dangerous force that still exerts a powerful influence on our times, and a legacy that starts a grim chain of events with grave consequences for Justine, Adam and even the world.
“Jake Arnott returns to the Beast, this time excavating the hidden layers of Hastings – a perfectly ramshackle seaside town – where the shadow of Aleister Crowley and his acolytes loom over this claustrophobic novel about a young arty couple trying to make a new start. Fans of Ramsey Campbell’s stories of deep-rooted British occultism will adore this.”
– Ally Wilkes, Bram Stoker award®-nominated author of All the White Spaces
“A haunting Gothic ghost story which, as you peel away the layers, grows like a gathering storm into a masterclass of British horror.
– David Barnett, author of Withered Hill
“Deeply sinister, and underpinned by a quiet yet deadly sense of menace, this tale of dark magic and an occult legacy is a riveting and disturbing read.”
– Lucie McKnight Hardy, author of Night Babies
“Netherwood flies at us like a horde of demons eager to drag us into its magical depths. Solidly founded on occult history, it’s a feast for fans of supernatural horror. Jake Arnott shapes uncanny lore to his own seductively diabolical purpose, and ends by shining a disquieting light on the world we live in.”
– Ramsey Campbell, author of The Ancestral
