Intrigue

A hard-working young man meets and falls in love with his sister's bridesmaid. He soon finds out how disturbed she really is.

A middle class family in Loire, where things seem just a tad off kilter. Philippe dotes on his mother, who has raised his two sisters and him. Gérard, a wealthy man just divorced, is paying attention to her, then drops her. Philippe is actually pleased, and retrieves from Gérard's garden a stone head - of the goddess Flora - that his mother had given Gérard. At the wedding of one of his sisters, Philippe meets Senta, a quirky and moody young woman: they fall quickly in love, despite her odd behaviors and Philippe's general good sense. Senta announces a plan for them to prove their love to each other; it involves poetry, tree planting, and murder. What will Philippe do?—<jhailey@hotmail.com>

In Lille, hairdresser Christine has raised her son and two daughters alone. Philippe Tardieu, who works in a renovation company; Sophie Tardieu, who is going to marry Jacky in a couple of days; and Patricia Tardieu, who seems to be using drugs, live with their mother in a middle-class house where Christine works. Now, while a teenager is vanished in the city, Christine invites her son and daughters to meet her boyfriend, the wealthy Gérard Courtois who has just divorced and is selling his house. She gives her garden stone head of the goddess of flowers Flora that Philippe adores to Gérard who tells her that he is leaving on a business trip to Italy the next day, but he disappears from Christine's life. At Sophie's wedding, Philippe meets her sexy bridesmaid and Jacky's cousin Stéphanie "Senta" Bellange and they have a one-night stand. Despite the unstable and apparently imaginative Senta's odd behavior, Philippe falls in love with her and suggests four weird things to prove their love: planting a tree; writing a poem; having homosexual intercourse; and killing a person. When a homeless beggar is found murdered in the harbor, Philippe decides to fantasize that he had murdered the man to prove his love to Senta. When he wakes up the next morning, Senta tells him she murdered Gérard to please Philippe and describes her crime in detail. Philippe decides to visit Gérard to find the truth about Senta.—Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil