A Fire in Their Hearts: Claiming Their Freedom Was Their Only Crime

“A gripping story.” ― The Scotsman
“A poignant love story suffused with a deep, moving humanity.” ― The Herald
“A memorable novel.” ― The Sunday Times

Scotland, 1662.

Hunted, imprisoned, and banished for their beliefs, childhood sweethearts Violet and Samuel are swept into a brutal struggle for religious freedom as civil war rages and King Charles II tightens his grip on the Church of Scotland. They pledge their hearts to each other―and to a cause that will test their faith, courage, and love beyond measure.

Branded as rebels, Violet and Samuel are imprisoned within the walls of the infamous Greyfriars Kirkyard before being torn from their homeland and sentenced to a life of indentured servitude on the brutal sugar plantations of Barbados. But when their ship wrecks off the coast of Orkney, they are violently separated.

Alone and held captive in a foreign land, Violet must summon every ounce of strength to survive the horrors she faces―and cling to the hope that Samuel is still alive. Can love endure across oceans, through war, captivity, and loss?

A Fire in Their Hearts is a powerful, epic tale of love, faith, and survival, inspired by the extraordinary true events of the seventeenth-century Killing Times, from Philip Paris, bestselling author of The Last Witch of Scotland and Waterstones Scottish Book of the Year 2024.