Legacy

In 1996, Sam Bellamy, the prominent human rights lawyer, dies unexpectedly of a heart attack, Cate, his wife, is heartbroken. She has lost her twin soul, the love of her life. But as the terms of his will become known, she learns that her husband had another family - in Bosnia. Cate’s grief turns to anger as she realises she has been living a lie.

Louisa, Sam’s daughter, is caught between her mother’s fury and her conscience. Can she abandon her half-brother, the legacy of her father’s affair? The child’s mother was killed in the last Serbian attack on Sarajevo and the boy is now an orphan. Louisa fears for the safety of this small victim of conflict and infidelity. She cannot turn away.

This is a novel about love, betrayal and commitment, which also takes us behind the headlines of the Bosnian civil war and shows how conflict affects those caught up in it.

Sue Wright has drawn on her own experiences in the Balkans in the 1990s. She witnessed some of the disintegration of Yugoslavia and the suffering of a war where neighbours turned upon one other.

We are once again in a period of war. This is a novel that takes us behind the headlines and shows how conflict affects individuals and creates victims.

It is also a novel about the condition of women. Legacy explores how women navigate the demands of marriage, motherhood, career and independence.