Opening line: They were young, educated, and both virgins on this, their wedding night, and they lived in a time when a conversation about sexual difficulties was plainly impossible.

Florence and Edward are desperately and completely in love, but relative strangers. In an era when open discussion about intimate relations is simply not done, they are left to fumble their way in the dark, both literally and figuratively. Anticipation makes them anxious, eager and fearful all at once. They have no idea that their greatest impediment to happiness is their total inability to communicate their hopes, desires, fears, anxieties, wants, dreams and true, genuine love for one another.

In an interview McEwan said he set the novel in 1962 on purpose; he needed a time frame before sex was openly discussed. One technique he uses that is very effective, is that there is very little dialogue between these two until they finally face each other on the beach. I feel so badly for them at the end of this book; I so wish they had someone to help them find a way to repair the damage they mistakenly believe to be irreparable.

"On Chesil Beach" is a brilliantly insightful novel that slowly crescendos to a denouement that is brutally heart-wrenching. Powerful, powerful stuff about how our irrevocable fate often rests on a razor's edge awaiting heedless actions or inactions.The movie version opens this weekend and I plan to see it. If the movie is half as good as the book I'm in for a treat!