An irresistibly compelling from the internationally bestselling author Ten-year-old Floriana is captivated by the beauty of the magnificent Tuscan villa that overlooks the sea just outside her small village. She likes to spy from the crumbling wall into the gardens, and imagine that one day she'll escape her meagre existence and live there. One day, Dante, the son of the villa's powerful industrialist owner, invites her inside. From that moment on Floriana knows that her destiny is there, with him. But as they grow up they cross an unseen line, jeopardising the very thing they hold most dear. Decades later and hundreds of miles away, a beautiful old country house hotel on England's Devon coast has fallen on hard times. Its owner, Marina, advertises for an artist-in-residence to stay the summer and teach the guests how to paint. Rafael Santoro is charismatic and wise, and soon begins to pacify the discord in her family. However, Rafa is not who he seems. He has his own agenda. Whether to destroy, to seduce, or to heal, it is certain to affect them all.
This is the second of Santa Montefiore's novels I have read. I really enjoyed her previous release The Affair and so when I received a review copy of her latest book, I was looking forward to getting stuck in. I was quite surprised to find out that Santa Montefiore is the sister of socialite Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, something I only found out after googling her before writing this review to find out a bit more about her. Montefiore has written many books, in fact this is her 11th title, but do be aware that this was published in the USA under the title of The Mermaid Garden. I think the English title is far more fitting to the book, I'm not really sure I understand why the US publishers chose to bring mermaid's into the title to be honest.
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