Caroline Davison ***
Elizabeth Holland is a privileged young woman living in 1800s New York.
She's rich, intelligent, beautiful, and wants for nothing. Even her best friends envy her – a recipe for disaster. But Elizabeth has a secret that c
ould threaten the downfall of her family – she is in love with Will, the coachman. When servant Lina – who is also in love with Will – finds out about the affair, she is consumed by jealousy and sets out for revenge. With so many people attempting to ruin, and run, her life, Elizabeth tries to please everyone. The last straw is Henry Schoonmaker – the man her mother has arranged for her to marry in two weeks. This scandal-filled book is an easy read and although predictable at times, some loose ends are left untied at the end. It's the ideal novel for a holiday.
Our Own Piece Of Paris, Ellie Nielsen, Atlantic Books, £7.99Lucy Corry ***
I spent three months living and working in Paris last year – and the night I left, I burst into tears at the thought that my affair with the most romantic city in the world was over.
Paris seems to have that effect on people – Our Own Piece Of Paris details Australian Ellie Nielsen's two-week search for the perfect Paris pad, armed with just phrasebook French and a wanton disregard for the complex social codes of French real estate agents.
It would be easy to dislike Nielsen – lots of us dream of buying an apartment in Paris but few have 400,000-odd euros to spend on it – but she does a good line in self-deprecation. Her fantasy world is so infectious that it's easy to get completely caught up in her search. A must-read for anyone who loves property shows on TV.
A River Called Time, Mia Couto, Serpent's Tail, £10.99Kate Hodal ***
Death is a funny thing – as Mariano realises when he's summoned from the city back to his island village when his grandfather dies unexpectedly.
But with this death comes multiple revelations, most notably about Mariano's own birth – and the longer Mariano stays on the small isle of Luar-do-Chao, the more he unravels the secrecy of his own existence.
This is Mia Couto's fourth novel to be translated into English and A River Called Time reads a bit like Murakami crossed with Maya Angelou: magic realism entwined with African folklore and traditions. Couto is considered the best known of Africa's Portuguese-speaking literati and this novel is peppered with references to the poverty, culture and hopes of modern-day Mozambique – that "frontier space" that makes the nation and its people as enigmatic as Couto's writing.
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