This is an easy-reading tale of the growth into adulthood between the two World Wars and the story of the rigid attitudes existing at the time. The loveliness of the West Country is brought out well, as is the privileged life of the wealthy in the early 1920s. Our heroine, Alexa, is a teenager when we first meet, her life mapped out by her parents and friends and she seems to have everything any young lady needs for a contented life, but as we move through her teenage years, the death of her mother and her father’s quick re-marriage she find herself increasingly alienated, despite her love for the son of family friends and desperate to see more of the world outside Cornwall. She escapes, comes up to London and takes a position as a ladies companion. Her new job opens up a new world to her, less restricted than her life at home, but more restricted because of the rigid social mores of upper class society in the capital. Alexa starts searching for her mother’s Italian ancestors in London, but her failure only makes her more determined, so when she travels to Venice with her employer she intensifies her search for her relatives in the city of her mother’s birth. Her life has it’s ups and downs, a disastrous affair for this rather naive and sheltered young lady which ends up being a mistress to an English Business man, the nephew of her employer. She loses her job and is left alone, but then finds her long lost family. The fine descriptive writing gives the reader an idea of the magic of this water filled city and the extreme emotions of this young lady. There are twists and turns to come in abundance and there are surprises right up to the end.