THE POSSESSION OF DELIA SUTHERLAND

Tales of obsession are this English writer's trademark (As We Forgive, 1986; Someone Wonderful, 1989); here, a middle-aged woman's obsession yields a late-blooming love. The setting is Sleet, an English country house and estate. Delia Caldwell is a child when her mother dies and her father withdraws into permanent mourning. Crushed by his rejection of her attempts at consolation, she grows into a shy, lonely, and outsized young woman, over six feet tall, but a capable manager of the barely solvent estate, at peace working the land. The author now involves her entirely credible lead in two quite improbable relationships. Delia is courted by rich, personable, gregarious Francis Sutherland, a playboy from the Bahamas. Why? Because, like Everest, she is a challenge. The couple's marriage is soon undone by Francis' infidelities, though there is no divorce. Some 20 years later, Francis dies (swimming-pool accident), leaving Sleet (acquired from Delia's father) to Leon Kennedy, the natural son he had fathered with a ``a whore from Nassau.'' Delia's dismay at her loss of Sleet is offset by a resurgence of her love for Francis, sparked first by her discovery (too late!) that he wanted a reconciliation, then by the arrival of Leon, who is Francis incarnate (though several shades darker). This new Prince Charming is as loyal as Francis was fickle, and conveniently unencumbered by relationships past or present. Delia swoons over Francis-now-Leon, and the two quickly become lovers. There are glitches, of course, and Delia even self-sacrificingly removes herself to a Scottish sheep farm, but the ending hints at an eventual lovers' reunion. An essentially silly story further weakened by a slow pace and feeble plotting.