After a childhood in Newburyport, Massachusetts, Julie Gower studied music and voice and has become a well-known and well-respected lyric soprano, living in London and singing all over the world.
Albert Gower is Julie’s father. He lived in Europe until just after World War II, when he was offered a position at Harvard and came to teach in the United States.
Beverly Gower is Julie’s mother. She is Albert’s second wife, increasingly haunted by the past – his first marriage, the death of their child, and all the unanswered questions that are suddenly coming to light.
Julie’s lover is Ian Hunter-Forsbury, a classical pianist and British peer, whose love and support are being tested in the most extreme of situations.
Rosemary McAllister, is Julie’s best friend. Witty, urbane, and not nearly as shallow as she would like to appear, Rosemary is the key to making sense of perhaps the most difficult puzzle of all.
Peter and Victor Gower are Julie’s half-brothers, whose dim memories of the past are brought into sharp focus as the trial tells them where their true allegiances lie.