MANUELA

A brief novel of considerable passion and power has been justifiably compared with Conrad as the violence of the sea frames and shatters a short-lived love affair. Manuela, seventeen, stranded in the Brazilian seaport of Babis, bargains her body with the brutal Mario, engineer on a freighter, in return for a passage to England. Once aboard, she denies Mario but attracts the attention of the Captain, Prothero, who finds in her an answer to all the lonely, disconsolate years past and ahead- and for three days and nights, as the ship starts to ride heavy seas before she founders, they are together in his cabin. But after the ship goes down, Prothero withdraws from her and the Mate is an accusing, avenging voice, so that when they reach England- Manuela is left to face not only the bitterness of her abandonment but also Mario's revenge.... An effective writer (The Edge of Parkness, The Secret of Seven Monks) Woods has invested a certain tragedy as well as a definite intensity in this episode.