First published 1999
Therese and Leonie are cousins of the same age, one French and one English, growing up together in an old Normandy house after the war. The thick walls of their ancestral home contain more than childhood memories. Their parents and servants maintain guilty silences about the past, creating an atmosphere thick with unspoken truths. The girls retreat into their own delicate fantasies to make sense of the adult world around them. During one of their explorations in the surrounding forest, they discover a ruined tomb buried among the trees. This crumbling monument becomes the key that unlocks a village secret and exposes a shame so deep it has poisoned their family for years. The revelation will follow both cousins long after they leave the Normandy house, shaping their understanding of family, memory, and the weight of inherited guilt.
Genres: literary-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, family-drama
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Normandy, France, England
Period: Post-War
286 pages · Paperback · Imge Kitabevi