Calpurnia

The Story

An elegant debut novel about a once grand Philadelphia mansion called Calpurnia; its owner, a painter and pa- trician matriarch who has recently died under mysterious circumstances; and the woman over-seeing the disposal of the estate, who unravels the secrets and intrigues hidden away in the hundred-year-old house. Elizabeth Oliver arrives at Calpurnia to manage the sale but soon finds herself piecing together the mysterious life of Maribel Archibald Davies and her heirs: the prodigal, tennis-playing heir apparent; the fashionable niece, designated as the estate’s executor; the loyal neighbor and keeper of the Maribel Davies flame; Davies’s heartbroken longtime lover; and the famous portraitist with whom Davies had an affair-become-scandal. Each of them makes one last visit to Calpurnia, and with each arrival, Elizabeth is drawn further into the family’s intrigues and mysteries, and closer to a revelation of its secrets. Combining a contemporary sensibility with a rich, timeless gift for storytelling, Anne Scott has given us a classic, uniquely imagined tale of suspense.