Briefly, a Delicious Life -- Nell Stevens, Hardcover

An unforgettable debut novel from an award-winning writer: a lively, daring ghost story about a teenage ghost who falls in love with a writer who doesn't know she exists.

In 1473, fourteen-year-old Blanca dies in a hilltop monastery in Mallorca. Nearly four hundred years later, when George Sand, her two children, and her lover Frederic Chopin arrive in the village, Blanca is still there: a spirited, funny, righteous ghost, she's been hanging around the monastery since her accidental death, spying on the monks and the townspeople and keeping track of her descendants.

Blanca is enchanted the moment she sees George, and the magical novel unfolds as a story of deeply felt, unrequited longing--the impossible love of a teenage ghost for a woman who can't see her and doesn't know she exists. As George and Chopin, who wear their unconventionality, in George's case, literally on their sleeves, find themselves in deepening trouble with the provincial, 19th-century villagers, Blanca watches helplessly and reflects on the circumstances of her own death (which involves an ill-advised love affair with a monk-in-training).

Charming, original, and emotionally moving, this is a surprisingly touching story about romantic fixation and a powerful meditation on creativity.

Author: Nell Stevens
Publisher: Scribner Book Company
Published: 07/19/2022
Pages: 304
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.84lbs
Size: 8.52h x 5.78w x 1.06d
ISBN: 9781982190941

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal Prepub Alert 01/01/2022 pg. 8
Library Journal 06/01/2022 pg. 142
Kirkus Reviews 05/15/2022
Booklist 06/01/2022 pg. 39