Absorbing tale a real page turner REVIEW

• Published date: 10 April 2024
• Publication title: Napier Courier, The

Millie has a modest dream — to own a little yellow house down by the train tracks. She works and saves and studies and takes care of the students under her watch as a resident assistant at the University of Arkansas

Into her life strides Professor Agatha Paul, a writer and tutor whose project on wedding culture is stalling.

Millie’s students provide inspiration, but of an unexpected kind. The university hall of residence is Belgrade Dormitory, widely acknowledged as inferior, a bit shabby. The three students Agatha is beguiled by are Casey, Jenna and Tyler, young women of such strong characterisation that the reader becomes equally as beguiled.

Agatha’s snap assessment rubs off on the reader: ‘Jenna: tall. Casey: Southern. Tyler: mean.’

This is a story about money: the getting, the spending, the attitudes toward it. Who has it, who does not, and how the power in relationships shifts accordingly.

Millie is clever and sensible until her head is turned by Agatha: older, sophisticated and somewhat ruthless. It’s as if...