Synopses & Reviews
THE TRUE STORY OF THE BEAUTIFUL
CASABLANCA STAR, THE WORLD'S GREATEST WAR PHOTOGRAPHER, AND THE SECRET LOVE AFFAIR THAT WOULD CHANGE THEIR LIVES FOREVER.
June 1945. When Ingrid Bergman walks into the lobby of the Ritz hotel in Paris, Capa is enchanted. From the moment he slips a mischievous invitation to dinner under her door, the two find themselves helplessly attracted. Played out against the cafés and nightclubs of Paris and the parties and studios of Hollywood, they pursue an intense and increasingly reckless affair.
But the light-hearted Capa, who likes nothing more than to spend his mornings reading in the tub and his afternoons at the racetrack, is not all that he seems. And Ingrid offers the promise of salvation to a man haunted by the horrors of war, his fathers suicide, and the death of a former lover for which he blames himself. Addicted to risk, Capa must wrestle his devils, including gambling and drink, and resist an impulse to go off and photograph yet another war.
Meanwhile, Ingrid, trapped in a passionless marriage and with a seven-year-old daughter to bring up, must court scandal and risk compromising her Hollywood career and saintly reputation if their love is to survive. With their happiness and identities at stake, both Capa and Ingrid are presented with terrible choices.
Review
“
Seducing Ingrid Bergman rapturously depicts the doomed love affair of two icons of the twentieth century . . . A book with both a sentimental heart and a soul of grit.”—
Melanie Benjamin, New York Times bestselling author of The Aviators Wife“Greenhalgh artfully shuffles the few known facts to create a rich, lyrical novel that manages their affair without a trace of sentimentality.”—GQ (London)
“Delightful and engrossing. [Greenhalgh] slips with utter authenticity under the skin of a female character. Marvellous piece of writing.”—Barbara Erskine, author of Whispers in the Sand
“A delicious tale of illicit freedom and, ultimately, thwarted love.”—Financial Times (London)
“This finely wrought study in artistic and romantic passion is remarkable for its explicit depiction of the devastation left in the wake of selfishness.”—Publishers Weekly on Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky
Synopsis
The beautiful Casablanca star, the world's greatest war photographer, and the secret love affair that would change their lives forever . . . in Chris Greenhalgh's Seducing Ingrid Bergman
June 1945. When Ingrid Bergman walks into the lobby of the Ritz hotel in Paris, war photographer Robert Capa is enchanted. From the moment he slips a mischievous invitation to dinner under her door, the two find themselves helplessly attracted. Played out against the cafes and nightclubs of post-war Paris and the parties and studios of Hollywood, they pursue an intense and increasingly reckless affair.
But the light-hearted Capa, who likes nothing more than to spend his mornings reading in the tub and his afternoons at the racetrack, is not all that he seems. And Ingrid offers the promise of salvation to a man haunted by the horrors of war, his father's suicide, and the death of a former lover for which he blames himself. Addicted to risk, Capa must wrestle his devils, including gambling and drink, and resist an impulse to go off and photograph yet another war.
Meanwhile, Ingrid, trapped in a passionless marriage and with a seven-year-old daughter to bring up, must court scandal and risk compromising her Hollywood career and saintly reputation if their love is to survive. With their happiness and identities at stake, both Capa and Ingrid are presented with terrible choices.
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Synopsis
June, 1945: in newly liberated Paris, battle-ravaged photographer Robert Capa is drowning his sorrows. After ten years of recording horror and violence, he longs for a diversion.
Ingrid Bergman has been sent to entertain the troops and when she walks into the Ritz Hotel, Capa is enchanted. From the moment he slips a mischievous invitation to dinner under her door, the two find themselves helplessly attracted. Ingrid, tired of her passionless marriage, and her controlling film studio, is desperate for freedom and excitement. And Capa is willing to oblige. Dinners in cafés he can't afford. Night walks along the Seine. Dancing barefoot in nightclubs. Trysts in hotel rooms. He brings her back to life and she fills the emptiness inside him.
Full of the romantic glamour of post-war Paris and Hollywood, Chris Greenhalgh's Seducing Ingrid Bergman tells the heart-wrenching story of the secret affair between the iconic Casablanca star and the famous photographer.
About the Author
CHRIS GREENHALGH is the prize-winning author of three volumes of poetry, a novel, and wrote the screenplay for Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky, which occupied the prestigious closing slot at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. He lives with his wife and two sons in Sevenoaks, Kent, England.