It's the 1960s and Louise is running. From her past in England, from the owners of the money she has stolen—and from Henri, the person who has been sent to collect it. Across the Continent, Henri follows, desperate to leave behind his own troubles. The memories of his past life as a gendarme in Algeria that keep resurfacing. His inability to reconcile the growing responsibilities of his current criminal path with this former self. But Henri soon realizes that Louise is no ordinary mark. As the train hurtles toward its final destination, Henri and Louise must decide what the future will hold—and whether it involves one another.
[A] slippery slow burn ... An odd, languorous piece of work: ostensibly a Hitchcockian thriller and teasingly, tangentially a love story, steeped in the fitful melancholy and low-grade paranoia of postwar Europe and North Africa. What it all adds up to is something more than glossy international intrigue but less, perhaps, than a full-fledged affair ... As a travelogue and a mood piece, The Continental Affair is undeniably beguiling and transportive; as a mystery, it drifts.
Christine Mangan is masterful at creating alluring characters and atmosphere with a hint of the sinister...She does not disappoint in her latest ... Plot moves slowly, but Mangan will keep you hooked with the tension and interplay between Henri and Louise. This is a novel worthy of your time.
