The French Girl

The discovery of the remains of a young woman named Severine, a decade after she disappeared from her Dordogne home, jump-starts a murder investigation in British author Elliott’s engrossing, if flawed, debut. It also stirs up memories for six Oxford University chums who got to know Severine during a week they spent at a Dordogne farmhouse. Hardest hit by the news is London legal recruiter Kate, who has never quite managed to get over her breakup after the aforementioned holiday with dashing Seb, a split hastened by his fascination with the elegant, enigmatic Severine. Already stressed trying to get her own headhunting firm off the ground and by the imminent return (after years in the U.S.) of both the now-married Seb and his cousin Tom—to whom she has always felt a never-pursued attraction—Kate really starts to lose it, to the point of seeing Severine’s ghost. Elliott has come up with a promising premise and intriguing, if somewhat stereotypical characters, but ultimately doesn’t seem to know quite what to do with them. Agent: Marcy Posner, Folio Literary Management. (Feb.)