Two of my very favourite authors have new books coming in April - Helen Dunmore’s The Greatcoat and Anne Tyler’s The Beginner’s Goodbye. They are both slim novels, novellas really, and both are centered around ghosts. Tyler’s story is about Aaron, slightly handicapped with leg and arm problems, and his wife Dorothy, a doctor who doesn’t give much of herself. Dorothy is killed in an accident in their home, and Aaron is totally grief-stricken. Then he starts to see Dorothy, talk with her, and even discuss the cracks in their marriage. Dunmore’s book is set in the 1950s near an airfield where bombers left on their run to Germany in World War II. Isabel and Philip are newly married and have come to this small Yorkshire village where he will be the junior GP. Isabel finds an old RAF greatcoat in the cupboard and uses it to keep warm at night. Then in the middle of the night, after her husband is out attending an emergency call, she starts hearing knocking on the window, and there, on the other side, is a young RAF pilot, and it seems she remembers him. But is he real? Two great stories.
January 15 2012
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