While my sister was on vacation with her family (camping and hiking with proper social distancing,) I got a text from her. “Have you read ‘A Small Indiscretion.?” she asked. When I said I hadn’t she said, ” OMG, you are in for a great read. She goes to places most authors do not.” And like always my sister was right!

Annie is happily married with three children and a rewarding career as a lighting fixture designer. It hadn’t always seemed that she would be capable of achieving this stability and success in her life. At nineteen, her increasingly erratic drunken father, and her parents inevitable divorce had galvanized her to leave homes and go to London to find a new life. But her sudden freedom left her unmoored and a winter of drunken abandon ensued. When she returned to California with a new boyfriend, the man who later became her husband, it seemed that she had put the past behind her and could now begin the life she had longed for so long.

Then one day she receives a photo taken during her time abroad and suddenly her past and present collide and the life she had so carefully nurtured begins to fall apart. The marriage that seemed so strong begins to unravel and her son is thrown from a car in a terrible accident and suffers serious and traumatic injuries.  Even worse it seems that all these events are somehow tied to that winter in London and the photo that she received in the mail. Annie must now confront the a past that she had tried so hard to forget and find the mysterious connections between her past and present.

This is a debut novel for Ellison and I predict we will be hearing more from her! Gripping from the very first page, the narrative goes back and forth between the past and present as Annie tries to piece together what has happened to her life. This is a story of denial, passion, love and forgiveness and Ellison allows us to hear the anguish, guilt and acceptance Annie feels as she comes to terms with the consequences of her small indiscretion.

Brenda’s Rating ****(4 out of 5 Stars)

Recommend this book to: Marian, Lauren and Keith

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