Publisher's Weekly
Malham House School, an exclusive but academically inferior boarding school for upper-class British girls, seems to house more than its share of vicious personalities. Sixteen-year-old Rosalind Tuck, blonde, beautiful and spiteful, and her malicious friends Amanda Loring and Colette Davies, take particular pleasure in baiting Ramona Charnley, a timid and vulnerable young teacher. What might be regarded as girlish pranksdrenching Ramona's bed with water, disfiguring her books, spraying her with purple dyeseem just enough provocation to push the already unstable Ramona over the edge. The only solace in Ramona's harassed existence is her quiet friendship with Sara Cordery, a shy but bright pupil, and with Sara's sympathetic and intelligent aunt Jennifer. When Sara becomes friendly with Rosalind, Ramona feels completely betrayed, and begins to plot a nasty revenge against the girls that is swift, sure and undetectable. This is essentially a thin, pallid and slow-moving story, with lengthy digressions, and with stock characters that inexplicably change their basic personalities from page to page. The author of Gemini shows ambivalence and indecision, severely undermining the impact of this psychological thriller.