Mataura is a small town in rural New Zealand where, apart from the odd tractor theft, nothing very interesting happens. But when the body of a young mother is found washed up on the banks of the Mataura River, the small rural community is rocked by her tragic suicide. All is not what it seems, however.
In Venice, Frances Croy is working to leave the previous year behind: another novel published to little success, a scathing review she can't quite manage to forget, and, most of all, the real reason behind her self-imposed exile from London: the incident at the Savoy. Sequestered within an aging palazzo, Frankie finds comfort in the emptiness of Venice in winter, in the absence of others. And then Gilly appears.