Like so many women, English housewife Eve Forrester's fiance died in World War II. She ended up marrying a man who is a bit pompous but generally very good to her. So what if her days are unendingly boring and she doesn't have a child? She's alive and married to a good man. Her carefree days of adventure are long behind her. At least, they are until a mysterious letter from a French solicitor comes to her doorstep. Her husband is convinced it's a scam but Eve decides to take advantage of the ticket to get away from her husband and her nagging, always unhappy mother.On the train ride down, she starts to meet the cast of characters who will change her life. The mysterious inheritance from a man she never knew sets a number of wheels in motion including propelling Eve into the fading but still glittering world of the Riviera in the late 1940s.
Included in the cast of characters are the man's two sons from his first marriage and one of their fiancee's (who is purported to be in love with the brother she's not marrying), the second wife and her daughter, an American writer, and a famous film actress who is more hopped up on pills than not.
Rhys manages to weave together several fairly disparate plotlines into one story. The use of present tense made it hard for me to settle into the story. It took over half the book for me to catch on to the rhythm. I think I understand the use of it (it's sort of a Gothic novel and the present tense adds to the general creepiness) but it did almost make me quit the book.
Three and a half stars
This book comes out June 11
ARC kindly provided by Atria Books and NetGalley
Opinions are my own
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