BBAW Day 4: Forgotten Treasures

 

 

Today’s Topic:  Sure we’ve all read about Freedom and Mockingjay but we likely have a book we wish would get more attention by book bloggers, whether it’s a forgotten classic or under marketed contemporary fiction.  This is your chance to tell the community why they should consider reading this book! 

I had to think about this topic for a while.  And there are two books that I can never remember the names of… I read them many years ago around the same time and often get the plots confused with each other so combine them in my mind.  I’ve always thought of them as one book.  Here’s how I described the plot to my husband: “There’s a brother that dies and his ex-girlfriend sees the living brother and tells him that she may be pregnant with his dead brother’s child.  And it’s very gothic.  And has ghost in the title.”  Maybe that’s a book I should write. :) 

I still haven’t figured out which novel involved the brothers but the gothic book with ghost in the title is The Ghost Writerby John Harwood.

 

This is a gothic tale with several layers to it.  Gerard Freeman finds a hidden drawer of his mother’s where he sees a picture of a mysterious woman he knows nothing about.  His mother is not happy at all when she finds out he knows about the photograph.  They are close and she often tells him stories of her idyliic childhood on the family estate.  A few years later Gerard strikes up a pen pal relationship with a girl about the same age who is disabled.  Eventually he goes to his mother’s childhood house to learn “the truth” about his mother.

I remember this one being a little bit creepy and it is a book where the details matter to the plot(s).  Looking at some of the Amazon reviews quite a few people were disappointed in the ending.  I think I’m going to re-read this one to see if it holds up or not.