Review by Booklist Review
When Hal, a freelance British journalist living a precarious existence in Rome, shares a night of passion with the mysterious Stella, he assumes it's a one-time adventure. Two years later, he receives an offer from his acquaintance, the Contessa, to cover the premiere of a film. Hal is to join the publicity tour on board the Contessa's yacht, in the company of the lead actors, the director, a photographer, the rich American producer, and the American's wife, who is none other than Stella. WWII has been over for several years, but Hal and Stella are both still haunted and even paralyzed by what they experienced. Stella's memories of the losses she endured during the Spanish Civil War are woven into the main narrative, as are passages from a sixteenth-century journal written by the Contessa's ancestor, on which the film is based. More stories within the story come as various characters unburden themselves to Hal. The result is a bit overladen, but the aura of Cinecittà glamor and the atmosphere-soaked voyage up Italy's Mediterranean coast make the trip worthwhile.--Quinn, Mary Ellen Copyright 2016 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Hal Jacobs has been drifting through life since returning home from World War II. In 1953, he is eking out a living as a journalist in Italy when he is invited to join an Italian contessa on a sea voyage from Italy to Cannes to publicize her film, The Sea Captain. His job will be to write about the journey, and the pay is such that he can't refuse. The yacht's passengers are the glamorous stars of the film as well as the moneyed financiers that the contessa has assembled. When Hal sees the wife of one of the wealthy men aboard, he realizes that it's Stella Truss, with whom he had spent a night in Rome two years earlier and who has been impossible to forget. At first Hal and Stella try to ignore each other, but they are thrown together over and over: at dinner, on the dance floor, and on the moonlit deck. Before long their love affair is in full swing, fueled not only by their passion but also by their shared histories of losses and guilt. In her second novel, Foley (The Book of Lost and Found) weaves a very satisfying love story, and readers will be especially taken by the luxurious Mediterranean setting. Agent: Dorian Karchmar, WME Entertainment. (Aug.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A tragedy-laced romance set among the glitterati on the Italian Riviera in the 1950s. Hal Jacobs is an English journalist who has been scraping by in Rome after a soul-killing war experience and a broken engagement back home. A friend passes along his personal invitation to attend a fancy soiree given by a contessa looking to raise money for a film. When security at the party busts Hal's cover, the hostess herself steps in. "Someone once told me," she says, "that a party is only an event if there is at least one interesting gatecrasher in attendance." Hal winds up having a rejuvenating one-night stand with a mystery woman named Stella, but she slips away without telling him her last name. Two years later, the contessa digs him up from obscurity; she offers him a princely sum to cover the premiere of The Sea Captain for a major Italian magazine. He will need to accompany the cast and other key players on a publicity cruise down the Ligurian coast to the opening at Cannes. On the yacht, he will at last find his Stellanow on the arm of her nasty American husband, the film's major backer. Foley (The Book of Lost and Found, 2015) layers the ensuing drama with Stella's tragic back story as well as the narrative on which the film is based, a tale found in the 16th-century journal of one of the contessa's ancestors. He rescued a beautiful, mysterious, and badly bruised woman from the sea only to become obsessed with her. All this, plus a changing point of view, makes for a choppy ride. Obsession, obsession everywhere, and a flute of spumante to drink. As in a movie from this period, melodrama and clichs are par for the course. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
