Chantal Thomas grew up on the Atlantic coast of France, inheriting from her mother an obsession with swimming and the sea.
In this tender memoir she seeks to understand her often inscrutable mother – a woman who was luminous in the water and once dived into the moat at Versailles, but who became fettered by marriage and domestic life. Thomas combs the beaches of her childhood for memories, recalling the sensory pleasures of sand and cold water, and discovering the multitude of ways in which she is her mother’s daughter.