Author Description

'Walking along the drab, grey streets past bomb craters and piles of rubble, I day-dreamed about a more romantic world where people spoke exotic languages, played music, and sang and danced with passion.' Trapped in the austerity of post-war London, 20-year-old Valerie Barnes dreamt of the good times promised by the wartime songs. Then two chance meetings catapulted her into a high-flying career at the UN in Geneva and the arms of a glamorous Frenchman... Joining an elite breed of independent women who travelled the world in the 1950s and 1960s, Valerie lived a jetset life as an interpreter, working in exotic locales and rubbing shoulders with prime ministers and presidents. At the same time she was juggling a Swiss chalet home, three children and a love- rat of a husband back in Geneva. But whatever Valerie did, she threw herself into it with zest. From dancing flamenco to being kidnapped in Cairo, wooed as wife number 14 by an African president or falling for a passionate Pole, Valerie's tales from home and abroad make A FOREIGN AFFAIR a lively, funny, utterly delightful memoir.