Book description
In her place as maid to Madame Patin in the cafe next to the sea,
orphan Genevieve becomes the breathless audience for her mistress's
alarming folk stories, beginning with the one about the mermaid - the
beauty who is also a monster - who must be killed. Genevieve happily
falls into the patterns and ways of Madame Patin and contentedly cooks,
cleans, gardens and serves the customers alongside her. Until, that is,
Genevieve ripens to siren beauty. To avoid the mermaid's fate she must
take flight. And she does, to a poet who has the hearts of all his
women: his mother, his mistress, his niece, his niece's governess - and
before long, his new maid's. Michèle Roberts, poet, essayist, and
author of fourteen works of fiction, was awarded the Chevalier de
l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France in 2000.
