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Tense and sultry, this debut novel is the perfect summer read

Voyeur by Francesca Reece (Headline) isn’t the first novel to follow a young woman spending a restless summer in France – just look at 1950s classics such as The Dud Avocado and Bonjour Tristesse – but that doesn’t make it any less addictive. It follows Leah, a young woman from Cumbria who finds herself drifting around Paris after being “ambitioned out of London”. She longs for a more fulfilling, exciting life, but isn’t sure how to build one – until she takes a job typing up the memoirs of famous author Michael Young. When he invites Leah to the south of France with his affluent family and friends, she quickly finds herself entangled in their murky relationships.

“Reece perfectly captures the anxiety of waiting for your life to ‘begin’ in your early 20s,” says Lucy Robson, Stylist’s head of SEO. “Voyeur is told in both Leah and Michael’s voices: while she transcribes his diaries, wondering what was written on some key missing pages, his perspective jumps between present-day France and 1960s London and Athens. With a complicated love triangle, glamorous settings, a cast of enigmatic characters and a mystery that will keep you guessing right until the end, it’s a genuinely thrilling summer holiday read.” £16.98, Bookshop.org

Watch Francesca Reece’s recent conversation with The Other Black Girl author Zakiya Dalila Harris at the Stylist Literary Festival on demand here


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This fascinating museum reboot is a must-visit for interiors enthusiasts

After more than a year of tablescaping, tidying and intrepid DIY projects, the question of what ‘home’ really means has never felt more pertinent. And so the re-opening of the Museum of the Home comes at a strikingly good time. Following a three-year makeover, the Hoxton institution (previously the Geffrye Museum) is flinging open its doors again this weekend, with a new exhibition space filled with three floors of galleries and installations exploring homes in all their messy glory.

The popular Rooms Through Time – showing interior design trends throughout the ages – are back, allowing visitors to poke around everything from a sooty 18th century parlour to the 1970s front room of an African-Caribbean family in the UK. There are also exhibits examining why we fill our living spaces with trinkets and heirlooms; how we express our personalities through decor; and how our relationships affect our sense of home. Outside, you’ll find Molly’s Cafe, a new all-day venture from the founders of award-winning Waterloo pub Anchor and Hope, while the museum gift shop is stocked with locally and sustainably-made homewares to feather your own nest. You may never want to leave… Opens 12 June; free but booking essential; 136 Kingsland Rd, London E2


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