From INTERNATIONAL BEST SELLING AUTHOR Sara Alexi, who ranks as one of Amazon.co.uk's TOP Literary Fiction authors
The second in the Greek Village Collection, following the wildly successful 'Illegal Gardener'
Marina is a gentle soul who makes a modest living in her corner shop. Her husband died years ago, and her children have grown up. Life is pleasantly predictable, if a little dull.
But not even her daughters know that thirty five years ago Marina spent lonely months on a nearby island, and the events of that summer have haunted her ever since.
Now Marina's daughter is planning to move to the same island and the past and present threaten to collide with dreadful consequences.
Black Butterflies follows Marina reluctantly revisiting the island. She has a plan, of sorts, to avert possible tragedy but in doing so she will come face to face with the consequences of her long kept secret. Will she be in time, and why does she never go anywhere without her big black bag?
Packed with a troupe of colourful characters that intertwine in a gripping story, Black Butterflies is by turn uproariously funny, touching or sad.
Exploring themes of bigotry and how doing what we think is for the best can unwittingly harm those we love, this is a gentle journey to one woman's redemption.
A word from the author - Why I Wrote Black Butterflies
No sooner was my first book, The Illegal Gardener, published than a conversation with one of my Greek neighbours revealed that she was married at thirteen and had her first child aged fourteen.
The same day I was having coffee with other neighbours and I asked if any of them had married for love, at which this cluster of women in their black skirts and blouses fell about laughing, and when they regained control, one of them explained, 'It's like being given a pig in a sack. You know that it will be a pig, but you don't know what kind of pig it is until the sack is opened,' and they all laughed out loud again.
The woman who related this had been married for forty five years and her husband had recently died, and a sadder widow I have yet to meet.
'And what of love?' I asked
'Well, there was one boy just before I married,' the first neighbour said, and it was the look in her eye that inspired the story of Black Butterflies, which came to me complete.
I talked for a while longer with this group of women and found out many other things about how they thought, all of which came from the circumstances of their upbringing and education, as it is with us all. We touched on various topics but at one point homosexuality was mentioned and frosty glances betrayed their disapproval. Greek orthodoxy does not approve of or even recognise such things.
'Oh, except for Panos,' one of the women said, and the ice melted and they agreed.
'Oh yes, Panos. Although he is a homosexual you cannot take exception to Panos.' Another replied.
'Nor Katerina and Mitza.' This comment brought more noises of agreement. 'No, you could not include them either,' they agreed, and so it was that the subplot presented itself.
Most of Black Butterflies is set on Orino Island which is a fictitious place based on the real island of Hydra. Here the donkeys are the workforce and once out of the narrow streets of the town you often find donkey manure on the paths. The black butterflies of the island are drawn to fresh piles of donkey droppings and it is here that they gather and settle. It seemed like the obvious title for such a book because, like in the story, from things that we consider nothing but a pile of manure beautiful things can blossom and grow.
If you enjoyed 'The Pact' or 'The Story Teller' by Jodi Picoult, 'Necessary Lies' by Diane Chamberlain, 'The Thread' or 'The Island' by Victoria Hislop or 'The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry' by Rachel Joyce you'll love this book...
