Book of the Week

Iloved Jenny Eclair’s last novel Moving – the story of an old lady who decides to sell the home she has lived in for 50 years and, as she takes the estate agent from room to room, recalls dark secrets and hidden lies.

Using the same device – an old house steeped in family secrets – Inheritance has a similar feel and I knew from the opening line – “The baby lies in the half-open drawer and contemplates the cracked surface above her head” – that this book and I were going to get on.

The baby is Bel, now a slightly overweight 50 something living in London with husband Andrew, with their two irksome teenagers who bear no resemblance to the sweet little boys they once were.

Meanwhile in deepest Cornwall, plans for a party are under way – a party that will take place at Kittiwake, the mansion that is Bel’s childhood home.

Over the decades, since it was bought by American heiress

Peggy Carmichael 70 years ago, the keys to Kittiwake have been handed down through the family, and now the house belongs to Bel’s adoptive brother, Lance, and his interior designer wife Freya.

It’s where Lance will be celebrating his 50th birthday, and Bel is invited.

But she knows that by going back to Kittiwake, she will be returning to the place where it all began – where, following the death of a her adoptive brother, a sequence of events was set in motion years ago, the consequences of which are still rippling down through the generations...

Beginning in 1950, the book moves to and fro between the 1960s and the present day, weaving together the stories of various family members, including Bel’s birth mother, and her adoptive mother, and building up to the denouement – the Kittiwake party, where old tensions resurface and, ultimately, take a tragic toll on one key character at least.

Inheritance is eminently readable – the characters live and breathe on the pages and it’s tempting to devour this fine book in one sitting.

My advice is to take your time: the author evokes the mood of each time shift so perfectly, you don’t want to miss a single detail or nuance.

I have a rule that if I doubt I’ll ever reread a book in the future, then it goes to charity. In this case, I’ll be holding on to Inheritance – after all, charity begins at home.

Review by Caroline Lindsay.

Inheritance by Jenny Eclair. Sphere, £14.99.