"[A] cast of well-imagined characters at crossroads in
their lives.Wonderfully lyrical passages, capturing a great city and
all its subtle charms."Daily Telegraph


"He is a specialist in haunting seascapes, creating a subtle and
gripping story."Evening Standard (London)

"[William Rivire] has a talent for lyrical descriptions of everyday events,
as well as of the marvelous set pieces Venice can provide. Heprobes
every nook of his characters' being.His creations are fragile objects
but a delight to observe."Times Literary Supplement

In the aftermath of the First World War, Hugh Thurne, a British diplomat
involved in the peace negotiations, seeks solace in his rented palazzo in
Venice rather than returning to his wife and the charade of his marriage in
London. Although profoundly disturbed about the long-term prospects for
peace, he has faith in the city's power to raise his spirits. Hugh eagerly
looks forward to visits with his old friends Giocomo and Valentina Venier
in their dilapidated palazzo by the Grand Canal, renewing his affair with a
young opera singer, Emanuela, and to the arrival of Violet Mancroft, the
widow of his best friend lost in the war. What he does not anticipate is the
shadow lying over the Venier family's future. Nor has he reckoned with the
vagaries of his own heart.

William Rivière was born in 1954. After graduating from Cambridge, he spent several years in Venice and now teaches at the University Urbino in Italy. He was recently made a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Earphones Awards recipient Simon Vance was born in England and worked for the BBC for ten years as a radio news announcer and as a narrator for the Royal National Institute for the Blind in London. Besides narrating audiobooks, he is involved in numerous stage-acting projects in the United States and Europe.