Emylia Hall's The Swiss Affair is part romance, part coming-of-age tale. Hadley Dunn hasn't had a very exciting life, but that all changes when the 19-year-old literature student decides to study abroad in Lausanne, Switzerland, for a year. Hadley is amazed by all she sees in Lausanne, and quickly comes to love the city for its physical beauty and its stories evocative of Hemingway's novels. She becomes close friends with Kristina, a Danish girl who lives next to her in the student housing, and thinks she might be falling in love with her tutor, Joel Wilson.
Hall's (The Book of Summers) central themes of love and connection are grounded by the novel's strong sense of place. Lausanne is more than just the setting; it's like another character. Hadley's relationships with Kristina, Joel and Lausanne change and grow as the months go by.
Life in Lausanne is fresh and exciting for Hadley--until an unimaginable tragedy occurs.
Hadley's determination to find the answers--both in her own life, and in Kristina's life--make her doggedly likable. She refuses to give up and is unafraid to seek out the truth, even at the cost of her own happiness. The Swiss Affair is an appealing love story with an even more alluring setting. --Jessica Howard, blogger at Quirky Bookworm