This is the first novel I have read by Webb, and won't be the last. The story kept me interested right to the very twisted ending ! This is the story of the Calcott family, who were to the manor born. There are so many skeletons in their closets, you would think it was Halloween everyday ! The story is in two parts, really: the story of Caroline Fitzpatrick-Massey in the American West at the turn of the century and Erika & Beth Calcott, who have come to empty out their family's house, which just happens to be an English castle. Caroline, born & brought up in NYC, marries and then follows her new husband to his ranch out west. She has a very hard time adjusting to life out there and is hoping that once she has children, she will be so busy that she will not notice how miserable she is. But after two years of trying, no children. Fast forward almost one hundred years, Erica Calcott is going through her grandmother's things and finds her great-grandmother Caroline's letters and a picture of her with a baby sitting on her lap. Whose baby is it? A hundred year old mystery. And how about a present day bonus: what happened to her 10 year old cousin Henry who disappeared one summer from the manor?
If you told me this book was a mystery, I would say no thanks, not a mystery reader. But tell me it is about a dysfunctional family and I am all over it. I guess this is the best of both worlds. Interesting how both parts of the story come together and what a twist at the end !
A good read.
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