Mrs. Danowski, known as Danni, is hired as a housekeeper at Manderville Hall, Lord Grenville-Whithers’ mansion on the wild coast of Cornwall. A loyal and lonely woman troubled by childhood memories of alienation, Danni dreams of finding love. Those dreams are fulfilled when Daphne du Maurier arrives at Manderville Hall for lunch with Grenville-Whithers. Succumbing to her secret sexual desire for women, Daphne begins a love affair with Danni. But, of course, such a love cannot last --- and both Danni and Daphne must deal with the aftermath of their passion. While Danni struggles to find a new place in the world, Daphne reconfigures the experience into her most famous work, REBECCA, with surprising results.

Gustav Perle grows up in a small town in Switzerland, where the horrors of the Second World War seem only a distant echo. He begins an intense friendship with a Jewish boy, Anton Zweibel, a budding concert pianist. The novel follows Gustav’s family, tracing the roots of his mother’s anti-Semitism and its impact on her son and his beloved friend. Moving backward to the war years and the painful repercussions of an act of conscience, and forward through the lives and careers of the two men --- one who becomes a hotel owner, the other a concert pianist --- THE GUSTAV SONATA explores the passionate love of childhood friendship as it is lost, transformed and regained over a lifetime.

Trapped in a London apartment, Beth remembers a transgressive love affair in 1960s Paris. The most famous writer in Russia takes his last breath in a stationmaster’s cottage, miles from Moscow. A young woman who is about to marry a rich aristocrat instead begins a torrid relationship with a construction worker. A father, finally free of his daughter’s demands, embarks on a long swim from his Canadian lakeside retreat. And in the grandest house of all, Danni the Polish housekeeper catches the eye of an enigmatic visitor, Daphne du Maurier.