The Legacy

by Kirsten Tranter

A WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS PAPERBACK ORIGINAL

A thrilling and addictive novel about three unlikely friends and the web of lies that unravels after one of them goes missing.

At the center of The Legacy is the story of Julia Alpers, her friend Ralph, and the beautiful and wealthy Ingrid. As students in Sydney, the bond that ties this threesome together is complex - delicate and intense, shaped by intellect, and defined by desire. When Ingrid falls in love and marries the much older and very handsome Gil Grey, she decides to leave her friends and settle in New York City, where Gil is a major player in the art world. It is here that she becomes stepmother to Gil's teenage daughter, a former child prodigy, and begins her own work on rare, ancient texts called "curse scrolls" at Columbia University. But on the morning of September 11, 2001, she has an appointment downtown. And is never seen again.

Devastated and heartsick, Ralph sends Julia to New York to investigate Ingrid's last days. What Julia discovers plunges her more deeply into Ingrid's life than she could ever imagine. As Julia grows closer to unearthing the truth about Ingrid's death, she is forced to confront her conflicted feelings about her former friend and to make a crucial decision about her own future.

Praised by international critics as an "entertaining literary thriller that skillfully describes the almost pleasurable pain of love and life denied" (The Australian), The Legacy is an utterly addictive and beautifully written novel that introduces a brilliant new voice in fiction.

Genres: Fiction, Book Club, Mystery, Australia, Thriller, Mystery Thriller, Contemporary

448 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Kirsten grew up in Sydney and studied English and Fine Arts at the University of Sydney. She lived in New York between 1998 and 2006, where she completed a PhD in English on Renaissance poetry at Rutgers University. She now lives in Sydney with her husband and son.

Kirsten’s first novel, The Legacy, was published to international critical acclaim in 2010. The Legacy was shortlisted for the ABIA Literary Fiction award, the ALS Gold Medal, and longlisted for the Miles Franklin award. Her second novel, A Common Loss, will appear in 2012.

Kirsten has published poetry, fiction, literary criticism, and articles on contemporary fiction. The Legacy was completed with the assistance of an Emerging Writer’s Grant from the Literature Board of the Australia Council for the Arts. Kirsten has also been awarded support from the Cultural Fund of the Copyright Agency Limited. Kirsten is one of the founders of the new award for Australian women’s writing, The Stella Prize, and the discussion series and blog When Genres Attack!

You can read an interview in Readings Newsletter here, and Miram Cosic’s profile piece on Kirsten in The Australian here.

Follow Kirsten on Twitter @ktranter

Reviews

[Elyse Walters · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘The Legacy’ ....a debut....by Australian author, Kirsten Tranter, was first published 10 years ago. This is my first time reading her.
The experience is hard to describe. Many readers won’t have the patience for it....but for those who do, they risk becoming totally enslaved to it as I did.
I admit being ‘spent’. I don’t think I’ll stop thinking about it for weeks upon weeks. This story is very alive and present in my head.

It’s a long novel....and it feels long. It’s a literary suspense thriller that is so unconventional- ‘psychological-thriller’ isn’t quite the right description. It’s epic, character driven, dramatic, ordinary and extraordinary.

It’s about friendships, ( complications through the roof), contemporary life, privileged upperclass lives, middle class lives, university students, book discussions, ( George Eliot, T.S. Eliot, Henry James, etc.), art conversations, being young, being old, being sick, abuse, travel, work, families, love, loss, deaths, grief, betrayal, redemptions, obsessions, affairs, secrets, [in Sydney Australia and New York City]....
There’s lots of drinking, eating, smoking, a little cocaine, trivial pursuit, hanging at the bars, coffee, bagels, in cafe’s, Chinese food take in, movie discussions, (Casablanca anyone?, etc.), beauty chatter, clothing observations, city life, sex, infatuations, jealousies, a disappearance on the day of 911....and the mystery around it.

A full cast; an interesting cast: ( triangle friendship between Ralph, Julia, and Ingrid), - their friends, lovers, & families, a professor, a fortuneteller, even a dominatrix.
Julia, a student at Sydney University is the the main voice narrator.
While working part time in a video store, she meets Ralph. She begins going to lunch on Sunday afternoon at Ralph’s parents estate in an exclusive area —Kirribilli— a suburb of Sydney—the state of New South Whales, Australia.

“Julia and Ralph loved each other instantly—though not in the same way”.
When ‘The-gorgeous-Ingrid’ came along, ( Ralph’s recently orphaned half cousin), he loved her instantly. Julia liked her too—after her initial mistrust.
“That affection was fraught with ambivalence but there was harmony between us that still seems musical and beautiful when I remember it, even when I can see the notes of discord that make it often shot through with sadness and envy. A little operetta”.

After Ingrid’s hefty inheritance - she travels to Venice and meets Gil Grey: an art dealer. Gil lives in New York with his 13-year-old daughter, Fleur, who was considered an art prodigy by the age of three.
Eventually Ingrid follows Gil to New York - and marries him.
On September 11, she has an appointment downtown- and is never seen again.

Julia to flies to New York, to do some detective work about Ingrid’s life....at Ralph’s request.

“The Legacy”, is a modern reworking of Henry James Portrait of a Lady. ... set in Sydney and New York before 911.

It’s sophisticated, intriguing, heady, suave, and stunning.

CLEARLY NOT EVERYONE’S cup-of-tea.....but it was mine!


It was dialogue like this that I found compelling enough to stop reading to reflect on situations from my own life...
....of times I hurt or offended another person - and/or times I felt hurt—even unintentionally:
“If she was flaunting some kind of power, I didn’t know what she wanted to achieve with it. I decided that she was drunk and for gave her, but it was one of those moments when something in me hardened against her, instant scar over wound”.

I thought about times a friend did something that bothered me —and how sad that in one ‘instant’ something changed between us.
And why must it be permanent? What stops people from having the hard conversations that provide opportunities for renewal?
I just know it makes me sad when things are left unsettling-resulting in loss.

As I said earlier this book is long, not a quick-page turner-but it is addictive. There are moments, though, where the reader needs time to think, and must set the Book down for a few moments to do that.

One thing for sure.... for those readers who don’t need a quick rush of a read ....this is a very enriching enthralling novel.

[Blair · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pandemic rereads #7

The narrator of The Legacy, Julia, lives a comfortable, ordinary middle-class life until she forms a friendship with wealthy Ralph and his beautiful half-cousin Ingrid. She's swept into their decadent world and falls in love with Ralph, who in turn is in love with Ingrid (despite being distantly related to her – and despite the fact that he generally prefers men). Still, the trio manage to maintain a near-idyllic friendship until Ingrid meets and quickly marries a much older American art collector, Gil Grey, and moves to New York. A few years later, Ingrid vanishes on 11 September 2001 and is naturally assumed to be one of the many victims of the terrorist attacks. Ralph believes there is more to the story, and dispatches Julia to investigate. (I know this sounds like I'm spoiling the entire plot, but because the narrative flips back and forth, I'm not giving anything away that isn't mentioned in the early chapters.)

The Legacy is loosely based on The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James. That much is discernible from a quick scan of the plot and the characters' names. But it reminds me of several other books too. The incredibly effective nostalgia of the first part of the story, in which Julia, Ralph and Ingrid's friendship is established and the three of them float around the University of Sydney campus, belongs to the elite collegiate atmosphere of The Secret History. The depiction of the New York art scene recalls What I Loved. Tranter's writing has the same clear, evocative tone as both Tartt's and Hustvedt's prose. Louche, ailing, borderline alcoholic Ralph is straight out of Brideshead Revisited; meanwhile Julia, the perpetual onlooker, is the Nick Carraway to Ingrid's Gatsby.

I definitely enjoyed The Legacy even more this time than I did at first. Everything about it is so marvellously assured and polished. The prose flows like cool, fresh water. Julia's voice is just perfect: calm, intelligent, yet persistently insecure; it encapsulates everything you need to know about who she is. It's no secret that I prefer first-person narrators, but Julia really is a triumph of the form. I love the passage below; it captures nostalgia so well – both the general feeling and its specific application within this book, since the reader, through Julia's memories, experiences the power of time spent with Ralph and Ingrid too.

The time with Ralph and then with Ingrid seems so short when I look back on it now – the time when things were good, just beginning, the dynamic I seemed to spend for ever trying to recapture and recreate afterwards... Those months were so full of what felt like then, and looks like now, an almost perfect kind of intimacy and intensity that makes that time extend outward artificially in the track of memory: Technicolor, oversaturated with detail, compared with the dimmer pasts that surround it.

And in these lines, Julia is talking about the work Ingrid was doing before 9/11 – researching ancient Roman curse tablets – but one senses she could be describing her story, her search, the always-incomplete picture of Ingrid's fate:

It was clear that the whole discipline of recovery was a complex tragedy of loss, a salvage operation whose finds, however stunning they might be, were random, piecemeal, tiny – small bits of a larger, unrecoverable picture. What survived. What died. What made it. What didn't. Who lived. Who died unknown. Who left behind two lines quoted by someone quoted by someone. A game of whispers.

Tranter is a writer I have long admired. Her work is so underrated (this – her debut – especially, but her ghostly novella Hold is also excellent). The Legacy is a little like a patchwork of loads of other novels I adore. Yet it isn't at all derivative. It was a pleasure to rediscover it; everything I originally loved seemed even better and brighter, and there were whole fantastic subplots I'd entirely forgotten. Probably my favourite, and certainly my most rewarding, 2020 reread so far.

TinyLetter

[Deborah Biancotti]

I wasn't sure what I thought of this book, and then I read Peter Craven's review in 'The Monthly' where he calls it a "crypto-mystery novel rather haphazardly linked to an allusive literary novel" and I admit now I know what I thought of this book.

Initially I was kinda confused because I'd gone into the book thinking it was a mystery: a conclusion I'd built from the back cover blurb & the apparent subtitle on the front ("What has happened to Ingrid?"). But it's not a mystery. Instead I was taken by surprise by how sombre it is and by the whole Henry James soberness (I actually wanted to write that as 'sombriety') - though I do applaud Tranter for fixing the depressing ending of PORTRAIT OF A LADY (thank-you!). Occasionally it reminded me of Donna Tartt's marvellous THE SECRET HISTORY in its undergrad/postgrad setting & mood. But of course at other times it manages to be entirely its own book, a more personal book than its two most obvious peers.

A quick précis: after a short, sharp prologue from Ingrid's point of view, the novel becomes the story of the more purposeless Julia as she obsesses over Ralph (& Ingrid, to some extent) while Ralph obsesses over Ingrid who goes missing during the 9/11 attacks which prompts Ralph a year later to buy Julia a ticket to New York so she can wander through the apparent end of Ingrid's life. So that even when Julia does discover a purpose ('to answer the question on the front cover'), it's really not her purpose, it's Ralph's. Which is very Henry James of her, of course.

I enjoyed some of the writing in THE LEGACY, but ultimately I wasn't satisfied by the book as a whole. I do admire books that can sustain a mood, though, and throughout this book there is a delicate sense of Jamesian portent - but it's often accompanied by an attention to detail so thorough that, say, the act of choosing a cranberry juice on page 225 takes 3 lines.

("Wait," our protagonist tells her companion, and for an instant you think she's found Ingrid, that there's about to be some revelation or terrible happening, some light or dark to what happens next. But then she crosses to the fridge and takes out a cranberry juice. And three lines later you're left wondering, 'did she pay for that?')

The feel of a mandarin in her hand, the spot of blood on a tie, the pile of papers someone carries - they all feel kinda over-observed and drawn out. Worn out, in fact, by the very insistent *application* of drama. The detail _should_ be dramatic, you think, but in the midst of the vast extent of the book's supposed drama, it fails to stand out. As if the drama isn't occurring naturally in the story. As if it is only observed. Not felt. And perhaps that's why I found the book heavy going: there's detail, yes, but there's not a lot of meaning to the detail. Which is a kind of post-modern contrast to James, really, when I think about it.

Looking back, I wonder if the book would have worked better for me if it had broken away from Henry James much sooner, shrugged off some of its maudlin earnestness and instead added some other dimension. A counterpoint to (the rather insipid) Julia, say. Someone willing to stand up to our unhappy protagonist and say, 'Oh, Julia, you miserable sod, get over yourself'. Some light for the darkness. Some humour or even a critical perceptiveness to alleviate the moroseness. It's almost as though the protagonist sucks everyone into her orbit of unjustifiable despair. Even a teenage party, even a sexual encounter feel kind of ponderous and weighty. And when Julia comments on someone's smile as having 'a transformative effect', I noticed that the smile came at the end of their meeting, not the beginning. As if that person was glad to see the back of Julia (as I would be, by the end). I had a sense, watching Julia meander through Sydney and New York that she brought the darkness with her; that it isn't so much that her dread is a portent of bad things to come - but a cause.

Okay, so I didn't like Julia. And I didn't like Ingrid, despite my sharp surge of compassion during the prologue. Alas, after the blunt and shocking prologue, she drops away to become little more than 'the object of obsession'. And stories of obsessive love or friendship - strictly imho - are often hampered by their own objectification. If you describe the object, you run the risk of your readers reacting with 'I don't get the big deal about Ingrid, she seems a bit of a princess' (I bet that motivated the prologue). If you don't describe them, you end up with a book that is self-absorbed, an internal examination of the sense of obsessiveness, a reflective self-consciousness. And THE LEGACY does sometimes feel like a very personal transcript by a character who's really rather mopey.

That said, I'll continue to read Kirsten Tranter's novels because I have a sense that with the perceptiveness and patience to be found in this debut novel, Tranter's work will keep getting better & better.

This review forms part of the Australian Women Writers Challenge 2012. #aww2012

[Astrid · Rating 5 out of 5]

*May contain spoilers* *May ramble*

This is a difficult book to review. And I'm going to start by saying that I think the reason I initially gave The Legacy four stars instead of five is more to do with the main character, Julia, than the writing. I love the writing and the structure, and the setting (the setting!) and the ending (the ending!).

Julia isn't so much a character as a human. Which is what we want in writing, right? And by the end of the book I really loved her. But most of the time I was thinking, mostly during the first half, 'Bloody hell Julia!' I also wanted her to form more of a bond with Ingrid, who was painted as a lovely woman, albeit flawed just like the rest of the characters. I just wanted the girls to ditch Ralph and have their own friendship. But I guess that wasn't really the point or the theme of The Legacy.
I was glad when Julia let go of most of her baggage by the end of the book. I actually cheered aloud at the last scene, it was such a great ending and satisfying for the plot and for Julia's character development.

The writing style is unobtrusive to the story, which I love in a book. And it paints pictures of Sydney and New York that made me recognise both places: it made me happy to live in Sydney, but also want to revisit New York (especially for the bagels, oh the bagels!).

Structurally, it starts of circular in the first half, then continues on chronologically. Nothing fancy, and the story and characters are so complex that fancy structure wasn't needed. (Fancy structure is rarely needed.)

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Legacy, by Kirsten Tranter, was longlisted for the 2011 Miles Franklin. It’s an accomplished debut novel in many ways, but it failed to engage me in a sustained way. I read about 50 pages of it, put it aside, and forgot about it until I realised it would soon be due back at the library. And then I had to start again because I couldn’t remember what it was about.

Like Henry James’ A Portrait of a Lady, the novel from which the plot is derived, it’s more of a meditation than a page-turner, whatever the publisher’s blurb might imply. There is a mystery, but the novel takes its own good time to reveal even that Ingrid’s disappearance is enigmatic. Tranter takes a long time to set its scenes, playing out sparse clues with dialogue and the narrator’s introspection. There’s a lot about interior settings, the timbre of voices, the clothes people wear, their posture and stance, and their fatuous activities.

To see the rest of my review please visit http://anzlitlovers.wordpress.com/201...

[Christy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't read all of this, but enough to conclude that it's not for me. I found the writing a bit on the dull side and the characters profoundly uninteresting. I had great intentions of finishing it in time for book club, but after reading the first 30 to 50 pages, I found myself choosing to do just about anything other than read this book. I made a strong push the day before and slogged through to the beginning of Julia's New York investigation (where the book *finally* seemed to be picking up a little steam), but the heavy foreshadowing (including the prologue that gives it all away in terms of Ingrid's marriage) meant that there was a complete lack of suspense and therefore, no reason to keep reading.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book despite its flaws. I liked the main character and I liked the story. I was very curious about the ending and was mostly satisfied with it. I agree with others who wrote about feeling frustrated: why did Julia take months to ask questions that were so obvious to the reader? It seemed to be a plot device to add suspense, but just ended up being frustrating to read. Some of the writing was beautiful, but it often felt the author was trying too hard to be intense and deep. The descriptive language just got annoying after a while. But as a whole, the book was enjoyable and I liked the dual settings of Sydney and New York post 9/11.

[Sally · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vacation-type book. Wasn't particularly gripping. I'm tired of the pale sickly homosexual character that women can't resist. Do they want to have sex with him or provide nursing care?!?!?

[Steve lovell · Rating 4 out of 5]

You remember where you were when you heard of them – events so momentous you just know the world would never be the same again. For the Kennedy assassination I was asleep, woken by a teary mother with the sad news. For the death of Elvis, on my birthday I might add, I was enjoying a celebratory sudsy bath, but that soon changed when the radio told me of his untimely passing. With Whitlam's dismissal, I had just come off class for the morning break when a teaching colleague, heading out to playground duty, imparted the news on passing. For this one, though, I was away from home, helping out on a school trip to the big island across the water. Someone had turned the tele on that morning in the staff quarters just as we were about to go out and wake up the students in their cabins at the Canberra camp-site. That was delayed as we took in the events and the repeated shocking images of the towers collapsing. As we eventually did the rounds, waking up the troops, we imparted the tragic tidings to our charges. I remember on the bus heading south to our next destination, Echuca, the driver had the wireless on a news channel so we could keep abreast of what was happening. Soon the students started ya-yaing for their music tapes, so I was in blackout till we reached the Murray. I felt as though my throat had been cut. Had it occurred today I'd be rivetted to some hand device en route.

So she was obliterated, wasn't she, on that day? Ingrid had an appointment with her accountant during those fateful hours, either somewhere in the Twin Towers or nearby. After that date, she wasn't seen or heard from again by those who loved her back in Oz. No remains were found. Gay and ailing Ralph, nonetheless, still yearned for her touch as he had been transfixed by her. He was appalled when she headed Stateside to marry the much older, super-sleek gallery owner, Gil Grey. Too ill to travel, he sent off Julia to do some sleuthing for him. He wanted to know every last detail about her life in NYC before the catastrophic event. What our heroine gradually discovered initially unsettled and confused. Then she really started to smell a rat. As she collected evidence Julia came across some very interesting, if flawed, companions of Ingrid's during her final days. There's the decipherer of writing who thinks he knows who that rat may be. There is one of Ingrid's professors, noted for bedding students and colleagues, who succeeds with Julia as well. And what does the mysterious Trinh, another academic, who moonlights as a dominatrix, know about it all? Finally we have Fleur, Ingrid's stepdaughter who, at four, was a child prodigy with a paintbrush, only to chuck it all in for the camera during her teen years. The more Julia delves, the more she discovers all is not how it seems.

' Days of Our Lives' soap it would seem on the surface, but Kirsten Tranter's 'The Legacy' is in another realm completely compared to that mush. To come by the book I was actually reading a review of her latest, 'Hold', which seemed intriguing. It began to niggle me that the author's name rang a bell. I checked on Goodreads to see it I had read anything by her in recent times, but nothing came up. Then, perusing my bookshelves, I discovered 'The Legacy' waiting patiently for me to get to it. So, before I shelled out on her third novel, I decided to see if she had potential by reading this her first, published in 2010.

I found 'The Legacy' quite masterful. It's almost impossible to put down as the mystery of Ingrid's departure deepens. The pacing is deliciously unhurried, all minutiae examined closely. Therefore it's a slow-burning thriller and all the better for it – a cut above airport fodder I would imagine. Tranter is far more pre-occupied with the inter-relationships between the characters than she is with the bells and whistles of the genre. As Peter Craven, writing in 'The Monthly', opines, it also is '...full of suave and stunning evocations of Sydney and Manhattan.' and as an added bonus, he continues, '…, this sparkling and spacious novel captures the smell and sap of young people half in love with everyone they're vividly aware of, and groping to find themselves like an answer to an erotic enigma.'

I am now in possession of 'Hold', as a result, as well as seeking out Kirsten T's sophomore effort, 'A Common Loss'. They will not linger on my shelves as long as 'The Legacy'.

[Jacqui · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was a bundle of conflicts.

The first 180 pages were pretty good reading and I was preparing for a three star book. I liked Ingrid the most, her free spirit and delicate nature ensuring she was entertaining at all times. I didn't care for Julia, who seemed a closet goth, always slightly depressed and angst-ridden for no good reason. I particularly didn't like Ralph; there's just something so sad and pathetic about a man mooning after a girl who doesn't even know he exists.

Part two of the story became quite dull, with the story line now resolving solely around Julia and her melancholy wanderings around New York. It was all very bland tastes and grey skies. Also a lot of unnecessary characters hindered the flow of the story line. Matt, the sort of flat-mate who pops in and out of the apartment at random intervals, and Mrs. Bee, the tea leaf reading hippie could have been cut out entirely; they brought nothing to the story. There were also several other characters, school friends and colleagues of Ingrid's I felt where pointless.

Once again I think the story should have been written by the most interesting character rather than the most boring. Julia was bland. Her strange relationship with Ingrid and Ralph made her seem like the outsider, never destined to fit in. She loved them both and at the same time didn't care for them. She didn't seem to care about anything, her work, her studies. I think she wanted to be Ingrid, not like her, be her, and that was the real reason she went to New York.

Ingrid was the star and should have been the lead. I felt dissatisfied with the tiny snippets of her life we were given. It was the same when I read The Poison Tree by Erin Kelly. Had this story been written by the perspective of Ingrid it would have taken a good book and taken it to a whole new level. I wouldn't have minded a bit more Fleur even, something to break up the melancholy. Instead Julia's sad, depressive ways set the mood for the book and never changed. And I still don't know why she stole things. It was a pointless inclusion. Someone told me it was a metaphor for her snap indecisive life choices; what rubbish. Tranter needed to cut two thirds of this book out and give Julia some uppers.

Finally the ending. What ending?

[Sam Still Reading · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Legacy by Kirsten Tranter. It has one of the most gorgeous covers I’ve seen. But the content is disappointing. The plot is good- girl goes missing in New York on September 11, 2001- or does she? But it doesn’t seem to execute itself well- jumping back and forth in time, vaguely alluding to events and skipping large chunks of time. After 150 pages, I gave up and read the last chapter. I still can’t tell you exactly if Isabel was killed, disappeared or simply never existed- but I don’t care. There’s no sympathy created for the characters and the descriptions of Perth as a backwater were cruel and unjustified. I would debate whether the author has ever been to Perth, as the descriptions of the city are unclear and geographically incorrect. Just goes to show that a PhD doesn’t automatically make you a writer! Research is completely different to fiction writing and this book could have used some emotion and editing.

[Jenny · Rating 1 out of 5]

Derivative.
Do yourself a favor and read Henry James' Portrait of a Lady (the author's source idea) rather than this book.
This book is also quite similar to the movie Sleeping With the Enemy.
I found the aunt's house to be the most interesting character in this book.
The cover is boring and uninspired.
Skip the discussion questions at the end of the book- everything is already spelled out in the book itself. I do not agree with the author's choice regarding her need to change Henry James' ending.

This book is lacking all of Henry James' subtlties and nuances regarding America vs. England and the roles of women/wives in those societies.

[Chiara Curtis · Rating 1 out of 5]

TERRIBLE!!! Finished it only because it was for my Bookclub and I am stubborn, but it was pshhhhhhhh!!! Been trying to sell mu copy so it doesn't stay on my bookshelf mocking me!! Do not waste your time, a much better read is to google the author's parents... A few connections in the literary world might explain why this book was ever published!!

[Sue Gray · Rating 1 out of 5]

Don't know how this novel got so many rave reviews - I found it very long winded and couldn't engage with any of the characters at all - I put it down after a hundred pages as I really didn't care what happened. I don't like bagging Australian authors but it was just boring.

[Shannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Julia is a student at the University of Sydney; to help pay her way, she works part-time at a video shop in Kings Cross, which is where she meets Ralph, another student, who becomes her best friend. Julia's love for Ralph is almost instant and unrequited - Ralph, bisexual at the best of times, sees her only as his friend and confidante. The two are close until the arrival of Ingrid, Ralph's cousin from Perth. She and her model sister, Victoria, are recently orphaned and Ingrid has come to live with her aunt, Eve, Ralph's mother, in their big old house in a wealthy suburb on the North Shore.

Ingrid is blonde and beautiful, and while disarming and genuine and kind, she attracts everyone to her. It seems like everyone is in love with Ingrid, not least of all Ralph. It is in part because of Ralph's growing over-protectiveness and interest in her life that Ingrid ends up marrying a much older man, Gil Grey, and moving to New York to live with him and his teenaged daughter and art protege, Fleur. But there are signs that Ingrid's new life is less than happy, and when she disappears - presumed dead - on the 11th September, the day the twin towers come down, she leaves behind some unanswered questions and many grieving would-be lovers.

A year later, Ralph, too ill to go himself, asks Julia to fly to New York to find out about Ingrid's life there. In meeting the few people in Ingrid's life, and her sinister husband, Julia begins to question just what happened to Ingrid on 9/11: did she die when the buildings came down, or was she murdered by her controlling husband for knowing too much? Or has she used it as the perfect opportunity to disappear - to vanish, to start a new life?

I bought this book from Gleebooks, a bookshop in Glebe just down the road from the University of Sydney, which seemed like a nice coincidence.

Because the prologue reveals to us that Gil Grey routinely beats his wife, Ingrid, and she has only Fleur as support - to an extent - it seems clear that the two real options are: murdered by husband, or disappeared to start a new life. My bet was on the latter, but really, the mystery isn't the point of the story. It may be the driving force of the last part, but the novel is about much more than that: friendship, unrequited love, the appreciation of art, truth, and self discovery.

I once wondered aloud at the dearth of stories set during university years: while high school is a popular setting, no one seems to write books of our tertiary life, which is odd, considering what an important time it can be for us who decide to go (and for those who don't - it's a great age, really, that 18-21 bracket, but why don't we re-visit it much in books?). So I loved reading a novel about university students, even if university itself didn't factor in much (in fact, it wasn't even clear what Julia was studying, though I assume it was mostly English - she referred a couple of times to Law School, which I thought strange, as law is a four-year undergrad degree in Australia. We don't have "law school", that's a North American term).

Julia narrates in first person, so hers is the only perspective we get; and like many narrators, she herself comes across as a passive character, not a protagonist but an observer. It's largely because a lot of her conversation is left out, her responses to things - we get her inner thoughts but we also get the impression that she doesn't speak her mind. We also don't get descriptions (as in, she doesn't describe herself) of her facial expressions. So there's not much to go on in learning how others see her, aside from Ingrid once mentioning her "withering stare".

But part of Julia's backseat, observational narrative is less to do with her being a weak character and more to do with how powerful Ralph and Ingrid are. Those two are larger-than-life and felt incredibly real, mostly because we've all known people like them: immensely charismatic, the kind of people everyone knows and wants to be close to, to be loved by even, because there's a kind of power in that that we want to possess - their power, or a bit of it. As a character study, The Legacy is spot-on, and not just for those two.

The story is light on plot, as Julia mostly tells the story of how she met Ralph, their friendship, Ingrid's arrival and how she affected Julia's friendship with Ralph, and then Ingrid's departure for America and how that essentially ended her friendship with Ralph; or at least, how it had once been. There's a great depth of nostalgia in the book that you can taste on your tongue. It's certainly not a story about 9/11, in case you were hoping for one: it's merely a plot device, though homage is paid to the victims and those who still live. It's not a particularly happy story, on many levels, not just 9/11 - there's a slightly subdued tone to the book, consistent throughout, that lends itself well to the mystery and the tragedy in general.

Nevertheless, for all that I enjoyed the book, I didn't love it, I felt it lacked drive - Julia's passiveness again - and was too long, too long-winded. It has a great deal of presence - this is one of several books I've been reading recently that prove that you can use past tense more effectively than present tense, which is a bit of a fad lately (especially in Young Adult fiction) and making me peeved - and I loved the parts set in Sydney, much more than those set in New York. Perhaps because I've been to Sydney a couple of times, and can picture it and I know some of the unspoken references, whereas New York is a make-believe place to me, in a way.

If you like slowly evolving tales, excellent character development and have an appreciation for subtlety, you will probably enjoy this. Then again, I do, but I still found myself merely glad to have finished it, by the end.

[Janine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a long book – 438 pages- but I didn’t find that it dragged. The first 2/3 of the book reminded me of an Antipodean Brideshead Revisited or Great Gatsby, with the outsider narrator watching wealthy people living out their greed and insecurity. There is an artificiality and staginess to the lives of these wealthy and ruthless people, and the glamour of the New York art scene does not disguise the curdled ugliness of these so-called ‘ beautiful people’. The last 1/3 of the book took on the pace and tone of a mystery, although its ending was too open-ended to be really satisfactory on that score. The descriptions of both Kirribilli and New York were well-drawn, and the dialogue flowed so naturally that it was barely noticeable. There were too many paranormal deadends – a neighbour who read tea-leaves and too many dream sequences- but she captured well the uneasy line between enterprise and exploitation, sexual adventureness and abuse. The book was an amalgam of a coming-of-age love triangle, shot through with a mystery. It worked for me.

See my entire review at
https://residentjudge.wordpress.com/2...

[Benni · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to the publisher and goodreads for the free review copy.

The Legacy focuses on Julia, Ralph, and Ingrid, three (sometimes) close friends. When Ingrid disappears in New York after the events of 9/11, Julia heads to the Big Apple to investigate.

This book is an homage to The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James; Ingrid's situation mirrors in part Isabel's in Portrait. It's quite a high order for one's first novel to be inspired by a classic work, but the author's literary background certainly explains the aspiration.

The Legacy is sometimes too clever for its own good, particularly in the numerous literary and pop cultural references perhaps meant to serve as shorthand for evoking moods or feelings associated with those referenced works. That is not to say the author takes shortcuts; this novel is very luxuriously paced, with no sense of urgency.

Undoubtedly Ms. Tranter is a talented writer, and her descriptions are so vivid that I was present wherever Julia was. Nevertheless, an emotional disconnect forced me to distance myself. Yes, unrequited love can be romantic in its way, but all the pining described constituted the petulant sort. And for all the investigation that Julia conducts to find Ingrid, the journey is all about discovering Julia. That is not in itself an ignoble cause, except that we must care for Julia. I did not care enough for any of these people.

Three stars for the exquisite writing and admirable aspirations.

[Oanh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am mostly likely going to fail to do this novel justice, but I also feel that I need to write about it now, rather than in a few days time when it will be driven out of my mind by the myriad distractions life currently presents me with.

This novel was almost meditative, aching with its drawn out story of seeking answers to the mystery of "What happened to Ingrid?" (the tagline on the front cover, although I must say my initial reaction to that was: why do I care?). I rather like novels about not very much, about rather mundane things, actually, even if the people in them are remarkable (or remarkable to the narrator).

Well written and captivating, the narrator is particularly well-drawn. I'd like to know more about her aunt, and her relationship with her mother and her brother, but those gaps make the story more enticing, rather than distracting.

[Kelly · Rating 2 out of 5]

I won the opportunity to read this book in a goodreads book giveaway! Yay!

Well, because I won this book, I felt the need to stay with it to the end, but it was tough. It took more than half the book to get to the real story about Ingrid's death or disappearance, whichever it was. Then, Julia's investigation was half-hearted at best. I never felt a connection to the characters, nor did I get a sense of their connection to each other. For me, the story just dragged on and on to a disappointing end which, made me sad because I really wanted to enjoy my first giveaway win. Sorry, Kirsten Tranter, your book didn't impress me.

[Amy Brown (amylikestoreadalot) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I stayed up too late semi-finishing this book,,,,I should have know when I was a few chapters in to put it aside! It had an interesting premise-3 old friends, one missing after 9/11, and the one goes to NYC to search for clues about her life since they had lost touch. But the writing was a bit confusing, sometimes I had to reread to see when something was happening or even what was happening. I never really connected with the characters, either. I ended up skimming the end to see what happened, but even that was confusing.

[Michael · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have a serious problem with this book - why is the grammar/writing so weird?
Is it just me or does the normal law of a sentence which has a subject followed by the verb and ends with the object been turned around all the time in this book?
It doesn't read like Australian English and it certainly doesn't feel like idiomatic American English either.
The writer has a rather irritating habit of mixing first person/third person view within the same paragraph, which makes it really hard to figure out what is going on during a conversation.

[Lilias Bennie · Rating 1 out of 5]

The dustcover tells you this is Ingrid's story and her friend trying to discover what happened to her after she had a downtown appointment with her financial advisor on 11th September 2001 ... and disappeared! In fact, on the front cover is states "what happened to Ingrid ..." .. enticing? Well no actually because I tried and tried but just could make sense of this book at all and in the end I just didn't care what happened to Ingrid. Boring, over indulgent and well, boring again!

[Teena · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an introspective look at relationships and how friendships can be ruined when sex is involved. Not a huge story but a very intense one. It turns into a mystery and I won't spoil it by telling you the result.
I really enjoyed it.

[Joanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found myself dreading reading at night (when I typically read) because I couldn't get into this book. Never did. Never cared for any of the characters. And I so wanted to like it but I found it lacking in substance. And now I can't get those hours of reading time back.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book and was sorry to come to the end. I found it a well-crafted story and wonder whether there might be a sequel on the way...?

[CJ Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful novel. I didnt realise its relevancy to September 11 until the last few pages. Loved it

[Suzie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have to say I didn't enjoy this book. I didn't care about the characters or what happened to them. I can not recommend this book.

[S.J. Hartland · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE LEGACY stayed with me long after I read it; fragments of the story, images of how I imagined characters to be, particular scenes. It stuck in my mind and for good reason: It was a
sophisticated read on many levels.
In her debut novel, Kirsten Tranter blends a mystery of what happened to a young student, Ingrid, who disappeared on September 11, with the internal conflict, life and loves of Julia through who’s eyes we see Ingrid.
Julia’s investigation into Ingrid’s disappearance after her marriage to an art collector becomes a conduit for her own transformation.
Coupled with complex but often flawed characters, this complex and satisfying story looks at life and friendship in the shadow of 9/11.

[Gayle · Rating 3 out of 5]

First up, lucky I didn’t deduct another star for the bizarre idea that Perth is some kind of backward country town without Thai food pre 2001 😅, otherwise I quite enjoyed this book. It was slow and kind of pointless and meandering at times, but although very slowly, I kept going. So many directions the story could have taken through the underutilised secondary characters who were made into primary characters without any real reason. Filler characters? A plot line that the author couldn’t be bothered exploring? I don’t know. It certainly wasn’t terrible, but so much missed potential for actually being great and when I got to the end it was an anticlimax. However i did like her writing so although this sounds like a 1 or 2 ⭐️ review, I’ll leave it at 3.

[Vivian · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a strange story. It felt liked it was just meandering all over the place. Julia was a real head case. She didn’t seem to know herself very well. She let Ralph have far too much influence on her choices and decisions. In NY, she falls into an affair that she knows has no future. The story itself almost seems like more about Julia than Ingrid. Her every drunken thought and feeling are presented as important to the story. The book went on far too long…filled with all kinds of descriptions and musings on everything from a birdcage to architecture to an old lady who reads tea leaves (and apparently uses drugs!!). I had no real sense of satisfaction with the ending.