By Esther Freud
Recently turned 17, Lara Gold is taken on a holiday to Italy by her father- a man she barely knows. Save a few visits at his apartment, she has never spent much quality time with him.
Lambert (the father) and Lara arrive at his friend, Caroline’s villa in a little village in Italy. After a few days spent swimming and sunning, the 3 of them are invited to the Willoughby’s for a meal, where Lara meets the beautiful and delicate Kip. Kip, their youngest and only son has 5 older sisters. Lara, as expected, is drawn to Kip and he, inexplicably and endearingly to her. The Willoughby’s at first glance seem like a family that have way too many entanglements, too many skeletons that have not been successfully kept in the closet. It feels like, if we were to dig deep, we would find scandals of incest and vendetta. As it is, they are a family with more money than sense.
Lara’s attraction to them leads to her losing her virginity to Kip, getting raped by the husband of Kip’s pregnant older sister and discovering that her father is in midst of an affair with a married woman (not a Willoughby and not with Caroline). Lara’s way of dealing with the rape is to stay away from the Willoughby’s and try to forget what happened, not saying a word to anybody about it. Whilst I couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would feel like, the fact that Lara just gets on with it frustrates me. The only positive thing that comes out of this trip is that Lara and her father manage to forge a closer relationship.
The author, every so often, cuts back to narrating incidents from Lara’s trip to India with her mother. These little stories are funny and interesting and work as a nice break from the unnecessarily complicated and tiresome lives of the Willoughby’s.
I read this book from start to finish one Sunday afternoon. Lara is an easily likeable character, although at times I did forget that she is only 17. The book is well-written and keeps you hooked, if only to make sure that Lara comes out ok in the end.