Leopold, Lord of St. Iver, sets his sights on the beautiful young Ethelwina, Countess of Auburne, and determines to possess her body and her estates. When she rebuffs his proposals of marriage, he imprisons her in his impenetrable castle in the mountains of Wales. Trapped in a dungeon in the ruined northern tower, Ethelwina will have to overcome Leopold's diabolical plots, including his intention to destroy her will by the use of potions, and his threat to rape her if she refuses to become his bride.

But the dungeon holds still more terrors for Ethelwina. Inside her chamber are a bloodstained mattress and a rusty dagger, and when a vengeful spectre that seems to be the ghost of her father appears to her, she will have to solve the mystery of his fate and revenge his death!

One of the finest Gothic novels of the 1790s, Ethelwina; or, The House of Fitz-Auburne (1799) has remained out of print for almost 210 years and can be found in only three libraries worldwide today. This new edition features the unabridged text of the three volume first edition along with a new introduction that reveals for the first time the details of T. J. Horsley Curties's life, a portrait of the author, and a reproduction of the frontispiece of the first edition.