First published 1984
Camilla arrives at her friends' house for their annual summer gathering, but this year feels different. Frances has become absorbed in her painting while Liz focuses entirely on her new baby. The intimate conversations and shared confidences that once defined these holidays have vanished, leaving Camilla feeling like an outsider. She watches her friends drift into their separate worlds while she remains trapped in her routine existence as a school secretary. When she meets Richard Elton, his good looks and confidence draw her in despite warning signs. Richard proves to be a practiced deceiver, yet Camilla finds herself pulled into a relationship that promises to shatter her careful, solitary existence. The affair becomes both an escape from her loneliness and a dangerous gamble that threatens to destroy the fragile stability she has built around herself.
Genres: drama, romance, literary-fiction, 20th-century, contemporary, adult-fiction
Vibes: atmospheric, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: character-study, deception, unreliable-narrator
Period: 20th-century
176 pages · Paperback · Penguin Books Ltd.