The Chrysalis

‘Reminiscent in many ways of Anne Tyler, Deveney grabs you at page one, and then slowly, resolutely, tightens her grip’ Scotsman ‘Deveney keeps us intrigued at every stage’ Glasgow Herald ‘I was driven to the ending . . . very good indeed’ Melvyn Bragg on Ties that Bind Everything can be changed. Except the past. Marianne might be losing her memory, but she remembers the night, almost five decades ago, when Patrice Moreau was knifed to death. She knows who murdered him, too, in the hidden room in the flat above the bar. And unbeknownst to her carers at the nursing home, the frail, sharp-tongued old lady once traded the truth for love. Only one person gets on with the irascible Marianne. And that’s Zac, a troubled young carer with a secret of his own. However closely he guards the truth, though, Marianne’s guesses come dangerously near. After all, she knew a man like Zac before. She helped him disappear. She helped him become a woman. Haunted by the events that fatal night in an idyllic French town, the dying Marianne makes a last trip there. She takes Zac with her, convinced that the hidden world of Bar Patrice can set him free, too. Before that can happen, though, everyone must confront one last, painful truth.