An Awfully Big Adventure by Bainbridge, Beryl (1989) — see its film and TV adaptations.
It is 1950 and Stella has been taken on as assistant stage manager for a Liverpool rep company. She quickly becomes obsessed with their dissolute director, but when the celebrated O'Hara arrives to take the lead, a different drama unfolds. He and Stella are bound in a past neither dares interpret.
