Echoes of Elgar

The mysterious music of Sir Edward Elgar's Dream Children has inspired this romantic and frankly sensual novel set in Paris and Sydney. Three people share a variety of relationships gently framed in music and an undiscovered secret only the reader knows.



Western France, 1995: Sophie and Holman meet on a perfect spring day. Histories of grandfathers in WWI have brought this French woman and an Australian man together. Two musicians in their middle years find true partners in that chance encounter…



Sophie's daughter Ellie is twenty-four, a brilliant cellist who grew up in Sydney dreaming of concert platform fame with her Elgar Concerto. Now she needs the kind of loving life her mother has with Holman Forrest. Instead, Ellie Bram's budding career faces the problems of her allure, her men, and that initiated by a shamefully devious father. When her great love does arrive, the beautiful young woman will test it dangerously.

An affair with an older man introduces Ellie, Sophie and Holman to sailing. Under Sydney skies their big yacht Contessa will move some narratives onto blue water. Years have passed, careers established. Now the deepest lives of four people are to be steered into an echoing conclusion.