Too Deep for Tears

Set in the 1800s when the British empire stretched round the globe, this is the flowery, romantic tale of three sisters conceived by a peripatetic father. As a young man, English diplomat Charles Kittridge married a spirited girl from the Scottish Highlands, who, rather than leave the glens, remained there to bring up their fiery daughter Ailsa. Charles found solace with a strong-willed Chinese woman, and then in India with an unstable Englishwoman. His children by the three women were marked as outcasts: Ailsa, for later marrying a Sassenach like her father; Li-an by blue eyes in a land that despised Westerners; and Genevra, branded a bastard by proper English colonists. Bound by loss, anger and the gift of second sight, the three convene at their dying father's request. Scotland, China, and India are colorfully sketched, but Davis tells a remarkably similar story in all three settings. Dull predictability is the result. 100,000 ad/promo. (Feb.)