Happily married and living in Venice Beach, California, television executive Julia Elliott's orderly life collapses when her husband is sent to Brazil for a two-year assignment by his company. Knowing that she will not be rehired once she leaves her job, she nevertheless agrees to follow him to the land of sunshine, tropical fruit and string bikinis.
But on arrival in São Paulo, Julia is shocked to discover that the city is marred by chaotic traffic, pollution, endemic graffiti and appalling slums. This is not the exotic paradise she envisioned.
As her husband works the long hours typical of American businessmen in São Paulo, their marital relationship frays; and remembering warnings about glamorous, seductive Brazilian women, Julia becomes concerned about her husband's late nights and weekends at the office.
Is her husband having an affair with his gorgeous secretary? And how does Julia really feel about Max Calhoun, the married, off-beat minister that she's met at an ex-pat theatrical group she joins?
Passion Fruit explores the personal and social lives of ex-pat wives following their husbands along the path of international business: the challenges are momentous, and the consequences of bad decisions are life-changing. Yet through it all another Julia emerges, and the 'other Julia' is indeed a pièce de résistance.