The Cheesemaker's House by Jane Cable

The Cheesemaker's House is a ghost story.  When Alice Hart's husband leaves her for another woman, she moves to the cottage they had bought in Yorkshire to attempt a fresh start.

The cottage was built in 1726 and once belonged to a woman, the village cheesemaker.  Alice begins putting her energies into refurbishing the old cottage.  She hires Richard to do much of the work, especially on the barn which Alice plans to turn into a holiday rental.

She also develops a friendship with an elderly neighbor, and the owners of the village coffee shop, especially Owen, the rather shy co-owner. 

 In addition to being a former pharmacist, Owen is also the villager charmer.  In folk tradition, a charmer was a healer, who took no pay for his or her healing sessions and often used specific herbal concoctions along with laying of hands and Bible verses.  Since charmers did not diagnose and took no fees, they were not accounted witches, but folk healers.  The tradition in England lasted into the 1970's according to one source.

When Jane begins hearing crying in the middle of the night and seeing Owen when Owen was elsewhere, things begin to get a little curious.  

This is not a typical ghost story, and there are several elements in the story that I enjoyed, but the solving of the mystery of the doppelganger gets a little lost in the genealogy.    

NetGalley/Troubadour Publishing, LTD/Matador

Mystery/Supernatural.   2013.  Print version:  229 pages.