By: Nina de Gramont
Nan O’Dea had one mission in life, separate Agatha Christie from her husband, Archie. She did it well and knew it was only a matter of time before she became the next Mrs. Christie. However, before that marriage could happen, Nan needed to settle a few things from her past. So, while Archie was preoccupied with his missing wife, Nan decided to take a holiday to regroup and say goodbye to a painful past. What Nan did not expect was for her past and present to meet and for it to be one of the most glorious weeks of her life. But how will it all end? Will Archie go back to his wife? Would Nan’s past constantly haunt her and cause her further grief?
Told from the point-of-view of Archie Christie’s mistress, Nan, speaking to the reader, a fabulous story (or three) are unraveled slowly. Readers will be quite caught off guard by some of the events, thinking that they are reading a love story that happens to involve a famous author, when actually they are learning something deeper about Ireland’s history. Readers will also enjoy seeing some other authors that were involved in the real-life search for Mrs. Christie. To this day, no one knows what happened during the time she was missing, but this perspective provides an almost hopefully theory.
Let’s start with this clarification: this book is completely fictionalized. It was so well-told that I did research after the fact to verify what was real and what was not. This is not the first Nina de Gramont book that I have read. My reading group read Last September years ago. I loved it and I loved this story. This author writes books filled with twists and turns. I enjoyed the liberties the author took to highlight real, horrific events that were occurring in the Magdalene Laundries in Ireland. I love a book that inspires me to do research. This is a definite must-read for fans of historical fiction.
Notes:
I signed up to honestly review this title from Netgalley.
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