In a dilapidated Victorian house on a quiet suburban street, seven Hook children, aged between five and fourteen, navigate a life that should be simple but is haunted by illness and belief. The eldest, Elsa, assumes command with a calm, stern authority, guiding siblings through daily routines while their invalid mother’s steadfast religious devotion shadows every decision. When their mother dies suddenly, fear of separation pushes the children to hide the truth from everyone they know. They improvise a life as if she were still alive, burying her in the back yard at night and converting the garden shed into a small shrine where they conduct occasional séances to communicate with her spirit.
Their outward normalcy is a careful act. The siblings fabricate excuses for their mother’s absence to neighbors and teachers, even dismissing their abrasive housekeeper, Mrs. Quayle. They discover practical ways to sustain themselves: Jiminee finds that he can forge their mother’s signature, allowing them to cash monthly trust fund cheques, and they uncover a modest savings of £400 left behind. This newfound financial leverage nudges them toward a more secure, if morally fraught, independence. Yet the longer Elsa holds the reins, the more tension threads through their make-believe world, especially when the question of their estranged father briefly surfaces and then recedes.
A glimmer of external contact unsettles the fragile balance. The younger children test boundaries when Gerty innocently rides a stranger’s motorbike, an event that deeply alarms the group. Diana consults the mother’s spirit, and the siblings respond with collective severity, harshly rebuking Gerty as a “harlot” and confiscating a cherished comb and her long hair. The illness that follows gives them a sobering reminder that their homegrown prayers cannot halt the real world’s consequences, though Gerty ultimately recovers.
The family’s fragile equilibrium shifts dramatically when Charlie Hook, the father, enters the scene. He moves in after a runaway moment of chance—a friend from school, Louis, is brought into the house by the boy’s own search for belonging. The teacher’s arrival, seeking a missing child, is resolved only by Charlie’s timely appearance, and soon he begins to take the children on trips, even purchasing a new car. The majority of the siblings, particularly Diana, grow to trust him and even affection blooms, but Elsa remains wary, sensing something disturbing at the heart of this sudden, permissive new life.
As Charlie settles into the household, his influence grows troubling. He spends freely, pursues women, and brings new looser company into the home. He discovers that Jiminee can forge signatures and manipulates him to sign documents without the others’ knowledge. He also dismantles the garden shrine, a symbolic strike at the children’s beliefs and their mother’s memory. The household’s veneer cracks when an estate agent and a couple come to inspect the property, triggering a race to keep up appearances. Diana’s resistance remains, but Elsa and Gerty deduce the truth: Charlie plans to sell the house and drain the family’s savings.
Confrontation arrives when Charlie returns home, and the truth spills out. He initially dodges, then openly denounces the mother’s past and reveals a shocking claim—that none of the children are truly his; he explains that their mother led a dissolute life before her illness and that she was not the wife he believed her to be. He asserts control over the property, aided by the forged signatures that left the deed in his hands. The revelation shatters the children’s illusion of safety, and in a moment of cold resolve, Diana strikes back with a poker, killing him.
In the aftermath, the siblings face a grim choice: bury Charlie in the garden and maintain their secret, or confront the consequences of what they have become. They ultimately decide to do the right thing, leaving the house for the last time and walking into the darkness to surrender themselves to the authorities, choosing honesty over the sanctuary of their hidden world.
