It is set in Tangier in the 1920s, where a foreigner working for a bank takes on a mistress, who turns out to be sexually perverse, possibly a criminal.

[1] The Guardian's Nicholas Lezard wrote in 2009: "It is exactly because we are not provided with the details that the book is so unnerving.

Yet it is about a woman who, if her crimes were made public, would, we are led to believe, be vilified and damned as much as any contemporary abuser we can think of."

Lezard continued: "I would not go to the firing squad saying that this book is about Morand's wartime guilt.

"[2] The French-Swiss film Hécate was directed by Daniel Schmid and stars Bernard Giraudeau and Lauren Hutton.