Maria d'Este is beautiful, effortlessly so. Her seductive power has attracted men and success in equal measure. In most ordinary women's lives, she is the dreaded "other woman." But now she has been brought face to face with the destructive side of her allure - and begins to realise the price is too high.Leaving the maelstrom of New York behind her, Maria returns to Paris, the city of her birth, to start over again. Now, she is determined, it will be different - that like her childhood friend, Beatrice, she will be good. But as she enters the world of the law in quest of women who murder, good and bad turn out to be unnervingly blurred. And once again her fatal charm is poised to damage.

Lisa Appignanesi was born in Poland and grew up in Canada and France. A prize-winning novelist and writer, she is a former Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London. She is the author (with John Forrester) of the classic study Freud's Women, the Charles Taylor Prize shortlisted Losing the Dead, and the award-winning Mad, Bad, and Sad: Women and the Mind Doctors. Lisa lives in London, England.

Lisa Appignanesi's profile page