The problem is that weakness of many a romantic novel, in an attempt to create tension, the lovers do not communicate. Meanwhile she came to the ‘river sea’ charged to find him by a little boy she met once. Rom notices Harriet dancing among the company of swans, and it is her positive goodness and gift for love that make him quickly fall for her. I didn’t remember all the contrivances as the rich Europeans, and the Brazilians and Indians rally around Rom, their leader by virtue of wealth and force of personality, when he needs it, while runaway Harriet gains the protection of the ballet company that brought her to Brazil, away from a cruel, loveless upbringing that would make the rest of her life a crushed one.
I remembered scenes vividly, such as when Harriet stepped in to dance as the ghost of Odette, and danced the part so powerfully. It features the incredible opera house built on the Amazon, a location with a real hold on Ibbotson's imagination, as she returns to it elsewhere. It replaces opera with the ballet, has two English protagonists, although Rom is also part-Ukrainian, and they meet ‘abroad’ although there is an English stately home in the background. Rediscover Eva Ibbotson, award-winning author of Journey to the River Sea, in her sweeping historical romances, including The Morning Gift, A Song For Summer and The Secret Countess, originally published as A Countess Below Stairs, Magic Flutes, originally published as The Reluctant Heiress, Madensky Square and A Company of Swans.This was the first Eva Ibbotson book I read and it was published third, after ‘A Countess Below Stairs’ and ‘Magic Flutes’. her elegantly written, witty and well-observed fables' Nigella Lawson, The Times Swept away by it all, she is unaware that her father and intended fiancé have begun to track her down. Performing in the grand opera houses is everything Harriet dreamed of, and falling in love with an aristocratic exile makes her new life complete.
So when she is chosen to join a corps de ballet which is setting off on a tour of the Amazon, she leaps at the chance to run away for good. Weekly ballet classes are Harriet Morton's only escape from her intolerably dull life. A Company of Swans is a sweeping tale of romance, freedom and the beauty of dance from award-winning author, Eva Ibbotson, with a new introduction by Joanna Nadin.
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