A strong early novel first published in 1935 under the name of Helen Ferguson. Set in the 1930s, in Bohemian London, Paris, and southern France, the story concerns a rich family and their financial and emotional vicissitudes. The autobiographical element (repression in childhood) is implicit for those familiar with the author's enigmatic life. The author actually identified so strongly with the glacial character of Anna Kavan that she subsequently wrote under that name.