Dreaming in French. Vanessa McCausland. 2024.

A remote French island. A crumbling villa. A reclusive film star. And an inheritance Saskia never expected.

Saskia Wyle spent one sultry European summer on Île de Ré when she was nineteen. The bright salt flats and sun-soaked beaches are now a distant memory, and one she made herself forget after an unspeakable tragedy.

But the French heiress she befriended over twenty years ago has left half of her magnificent home to Saskia and the other half to Félix Allard, a now-reclusive film star living on the island. How did Simone Durant die? Was it the family curse that haunted her? And why has she included Saskia in her will after all this time? 

Saskia returns to the place of dry-stone walls and ancient olive trees to find that Simone has left her another expected gift - a manscript written in French. With the lyrical language embedded somewhere in her subconscious , Saskia has to find a way to understand what Simone is telling her. And as she once again falls under the island’s spell, she must reckon with her past to save what is most precious to her.