Twilight & Moonbeam Alley

"Twilight, based on the real life of Madame de Prie, evokes the downfall of a powerful lady who is banished from Versailles by order of the King. She tries to make the best of living on her country estate, but although she takes a lover and invites friends from Paris, she finds her exile intolerable. Life at court, for all its essential emptiness, was the only thing that gave her existence meaning." "The traveller delayed in a French port on his way home to Germany explores the sailors' quarter as night falls, in Moonbeam Alley. Enticed by a voice singing a Weber aria to an insalubrious bar near the harbour, the narrator learns the story of those who run and frequent it: a tale of passion, torment and violence of which he becomes the unwilling witness."--BOOK JACKET.