Colette, Brittany, Ripening Seed

As you may know if you visit here regularly, I spend quite a bit of time in France. I've got a house there, on the border of Normandy and Brittany. We can get to a beach in Normandy in just over half an hour, but we prefer the beautiful bays around Cancale, near St Malo, on the north Brittany coast. There are many glorious beaches here but our absolute favorite is one which can only be reached by parking on the road and walking down a sandy path between pine trees until you emerge onto a stretch of white sand, with rocks and pools on either side, and a wonderful cliff-top walk strewn with wild herbs and flowers. And just set back off the beach is the most lovely house, which year after year we have gazed at with envy and wished so much we could live there. This year I was there with my daughter who cleverly discovered that this house, Ros Ven, used to belong to the great French writer Colette, who spent many summers there. Not only that, but she wrote a novel there and set it in and around the house and the beach. So of course I had to get the novel forthwith. In French it is called Le Ble en Herbe, which is usually translated as Ripening Seed though in actual fact the French really means 'Wheat that has just sprouted' or some such thing -- not a great title, let's face it.
Anyway, I managed to get myself a copy on Amazon, though not the one that appears in this picture. I'm ashamed to say this is the first Colette novel I have ever read, though I did start one in French which I found pretty difficult -- my French was not really up to the complex and convoluted sentences and subtle terminology, and I abandoned it before the end.
Ripening Seed is the story of Philippe and Vinca, aged 16 and 15. Every year since they were tiny children their parents, who are old friends, have rented this house for the summer, and the children have grown up more or less as brother and sister. They know every inch of the beach, the cliff path, all the secret rock pools and tiny bays, and their days are spent swimming, fishing, catching shrimps in the pools. This year they have fallen into a different kind of relationship -- in fact they have fallen in love. But they are young and innocent and so Philippe, at least, thinks he must wait many years before they can develop this into a full love affair. Then one day, on the way back from the post office in St Malo, he encounters a woman who has rented a house just up the road. Beautiful, sophisticated, she is clearly drawn to him and before long she has seduced him. Philippe is now living in a sort of mad dream, escaping every night when the house is asleep to enjoy this extraordinary new experience, but feeling wracked with guilt about Vinca, who he assumes knows nothing of this. Things, of course, do not work out as he has expected.
I was very glad to have read this but the translation I bought was, I'm afraid, simply dreadful. French is a difficult language to translate well at the best of times, and having had a taste of Colette's French I'm guessing it would be particularly challenging. Still, it was just so lovely to be able to picture, from memory, all the places the children spend their time. I will try to get a better translation, and I do want to read more Colette now. Any suggestions?