Rather a slow starter, largely because Emma, the heroine, is so determinedly self-opinionated. The story starts with her running away from her wealthy parents' home after having completed her A Levels to go to Italy before returning in the autumn to go to Oxford. At that stage it is difficult to see her as anything other than a poor little rich girl suffering a strop because she can't get her own way.
However, as the novel develops one does come to accept, and then empathise with her. The Tuscan scenery and the extremes of the local climate are beautifully conveyed, and the sultry environment matches the change in Emma's demeanour. As she goes on a journey of self discovery she has to meet with corruption and treachery, and she gradually comes to realise that one of her fellow Britsh expats may have been murdered, rather than just gone travelling as the local community has been led to believe. Meanwhile, as Emma learns how to paint, she also comes to fence verbally and emotionally with Andrew Evenlode, her would-be tutor at Oxford if she can be persuaded to take up the place at Magdalen that she has been offered.
This was Amanda Craig's first novel, and already one can see the seeds of her subsequent penchant for intricate plotting. It took me about thirty or forty pages before I was convinced, but thereafter I was sure that this was a fine novel. Definitely worth reading.
In her most recent books Amanda Craig has tended to chose one of the less central characters to be the central figure in her next novel, so i am intrigued to see who is the principal character in her second book! ( )

A first novel about a precocious and spoilt girl who runs away from home to Italy, discovers sex, art and grown up life and (spoiler alert) returns back home older and wiser. The heroine is resolutely spiky and dislikable, but compelling in her wilful mistakes and refusal either to understand or compromise. The minor characters are not brilliantly differentiated and there are probably rather too many of them, but there is enough vivid description and acute characterisation to make this both readable and promising..