A lady of pleasure

the long version

In A Lady of Pleasure, Charles Edward Eaton tells a compelling and poignant story of a love affair between an American, Eve Bahnson, and a handsome, almost mythical, Brazilian half her age. Set in Rio de Janeiro under the Getulio Vargas dictatorship during the Second World War, the novel portrays the struggle of lovers with time and the powerful influence of Rio, a cidade maravilhosa, the "marvelous city" of legend, both hauntingly beautiful and disturbingly real, heating amorous adventure in what Roland Barthes has called "the brazier of meaning."