“Expect unease…expect to find yourself on a cold empty beach…for the land here speaks in a deceptive tongue…”, in undercurrents of breaking waves and in the prominence of ancient stones. Before a virtual journey to the village of Kerliac, this reader listened to a short overture, Vaulted Night: A Musical Discovery. Breathtaking views of the Breton coast were accompanied by the beautiful music of pianist/composer/author Leona Francombe. Yann St-Clair, a transplant from Breton, was a highly respected film producer/director in London. Call it fate-destiny-chance. When he entered a coffee shop, this visit would impact his life as well as that of fledgling musician Alice Gray, his waitress. He remarked that she had "piano hands,” admired her pale green eyes and felt that she radiated an “aura”. “It was rumored that he had a fascination for myths and old stones.” One musical demo later, Alice was offered a chance to compose seventy minutes of music as background for Yann’s upcoming documentary. His grandparents' stone cottage in Brittany, with its nearby heath “littered with standing stones” was “alert with the past…and earth energy.” This was the perfect setting for Alice to listen to the land and the musical sound of the rocks and the sea, a place where history lingered through a rift of time, a place where ghosts and shadows were ever present. Yann St-Clair wanted Alice to capture the haunted history of Breton in her composition. This would require a stay at his family cottage. Warnings about gales and tides in this “alien landscape” were provided by Luc, caretaker for Yann’s cottage. The village of Kerliac contained few shops but boasted a war memorial. In addition to the names engraved with dates 1914-1918, there were six names from 1940-1945 that stood out, one of which was Philippe St-Clair, Yann’s grandfather. Philippe was killed by the Germans on 19 July. Alice noticed that the cottage wall had an empty, discolored space where a framed picture had been hung. Family secrets were closely guarded. Luc, a young boy during WW II, might be encouraged to shed light on the past. As the reader, I would have enjoyed a spot of tea and a box of galettes bretonnes (butter biscuits of Brittany) while being transported to the atmospheric seascape where one must be careful not to stray too far on the beach when the tide was out. Warning: A gale was coming! A storm of an entirely different nature was unearthed as the forward and back continuum of past and present demanded a reckoning. On the beach facing the sea were weathered remnants of concrete Nazi bunkers built for the Germans by Breton laborers. During the occupation, two German sentries were stationed close to the cottage. Isabelle St-Clair, Yann’s grandmother, was a gifted pianist who was ill at ease in Breton. As her husband fought alongside the French Resistance, she was left alone. Her piano expertise was appreciated by an audience of two who sat outside, beneath her windows listening to melodious arpeggios. Cottage bound by the storm, Alice located an undiscovered trove of Isabelle’s music and a cache of letters tied in bright ribbon, the contents of which further enhanced Alice’s imagination. A four measure phrase…theme in C major…is the music in the air? Did the rocks sing or does the music contain lingering emotions of Isabelle St-Clair? Alice was being pulled into the enigmatic past where generational ghosts and shadows had toyed with Yann’s feelings. Can the tragedy finally be laid to rest? Vaulted Night is literary fiction at its best. Author Francombe’s musical knowledge infuses this novella with incredible emotional depth. Highly recommended.

Leona Francombe, author of the highly acclaimed novel The Heron Legacy (2024), has prepared a haunting follow-up for us, namely, Vaulted Night: A Novella of the Uncanny. If you're not yet acquainted with Francombe, she's a noted pianist and composer who has built a reputation for creating stories with musical or historical inspiration at their core. Vaulted Night, whose title is drawn from a poem by Charles Pierre Baudelaire, continues this thematic pattern. Vaulted Night takes us into the world of Alice Gray, a pianist and composer herself, but one who has not yet found success. A resident of London, she makes her living as a waitress while grappling with the world's indifference to her musical aspirations. One day, she has the good fortune to wait on Yann St-Clair, a film director and producer from Brittany, France, who has risen to the pinnacle of his field and moved into a mansion on British soil. St-Clair samples Alice's musical acumen, invites her to compose some material for an upcoming movie of his, and sends her to Kerliac, a small village on the Breton coast. That's where Yann's grandmother, Isabelle, a gifted pianist in her own right, lived with her husband, Phillippe, during the German occupation of France during the Second World War. Upon arriving in Kerliac, a "cheerless" place that's "mute as a tomb", Alice is met by Luc and Benedicte, the caretakers of the cottage where Yann's grandparents resided and where Alice will compose her musical score. While there, she will also come face to face with a tragic secret the St-Clair family has kept hidden since the 1940s. Without revealing too much, I can say Vaulted Night is a mesmerizing tale of forbidden love and reconciliation with the past, all borne along on an undercurrent that veers into the supernatural. Yann has given Alice the opportunity of a lifetime, wisely recognizing that "great artists should never be given the label of their menial jobs", and while the story could have centered on Alice and her ascent from obscurity, I appreciated how it focused instead on the way she is called upon to repay her benefactor. Francombe's graceful prose style never falters, and it made me happy to keep turning the pages. She provides enough evidence in Vaulted Night for the reader to figure out the "big reveal", but even if you do work it out, that doesn't lessen its impact. The author is also kind enough to provide us with the first six notes of the theme Alice composes. You may want to play them on your instrument of choice, and perhaps even try to imagine where Alice may have gone with them next. That's what I did, at least, and it added an enjoyable extra dimension to an enjoyable read. Paul Preziosi

Reviewed by Gaius Konstantine for Readers’ Favorite, 5 stars “Sometimes being unschooled is an advantage in art: you have more freedom to unlock your emotions . . . to not know when you’ve crossed a boundary that probably shouldn’t have been there in the first place.” Boundaries fade in Vaulted Night (A Novella of the Uncanny) by Leona Francombe, and reality itself bends. The story centers on Alice Gray, an obscure composer who has a chance encounter with Yann St-Clair, a filmmaker who is anything but obscure. At his urging, Alice finds herself in a small town in Brittany, a place where the ancient and nature’s majesty exist side by side. Seeking inspiration from this unique setting, she slips into a different existence as she comes to understand that to connect with the living atmosphere of a place, one must first learn its dead past and the nuances of truth. Surprising and refined, Vaulted Night is an elegant work of literary fiction. Its intricate plot is subtly revealed to be more than a woman’s search for musical inspiration; it becomes a quiet unearthing of the recent past. Throughout the narrative, themes of self-discovery and reconciliation with uncomfortable truths lend a poetic flair. Character development is exceptional, with even the minor figures proving eclectic and unforgettable. Indeed, even the unusual chapter structure works quite well in this story and makes for a quick read. The measured pace, paired with clean yet graceful prose, makes Vaulted Night an excellent choice for readers seeking something fresh and distinctive, while offering a perfect reminder that music can transcend reality.