Trespass, Rose Tremain (Vintage Books)
by Patrick O'Connor
IN the Cevennes region of France, 10 year old Melodie skips away from her school picnic to explore.
To her delight she comes across a 'deep, sea-green pool' and strips down to her knickers to prepare to dive in when 'at the very corner of her vision, she sees something which shouldn't be there...then she starts screaming.'
In trendy Pimlico in London, 64 year old antique shop owner Anthony Verey has reached a crisis point in his life. His business is struggling and he fears for his future. 'All he could envisage, all he could see waiting for him....was a slow and lonely decline.' He decides to visit his sister Veronica and her lover Kitty in France, an arrival fiercely unwelcomed by Kitty.
Back in the Cevennes, Audrun Lunel is coming to terms with the news that her brother Aramon is planning to sell his home, which borders her small, run-down bungalow. This brings to the fore, painful memories which have a dramatic effect on both siblings.
Thus the various strands of Rose Tremain's Trepass are established. Apart from the opening chapter we don't revisit young Melodie until the end of the book and so we are left to guess what startled her so much at the pool.
Along the way Tremain explores family relationships, love, jealously, sexual abuse and 'foreigners' buying up second homes in France.
The author expertly begins to link the different narratives and we gradually see the bigger picture unfold as we approach a dramatic climax.
Story telling at its very best.