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Reputedly a brilliant lecturer (this from a former student, and aren't students the harshest of an academic's critics?) John Harwood is no stranger to writing. Despite having produced biography, poetry and short (hitherto unpublished) stories, Harwood's THE GHOST WRITER is his first sally into longer fiction. Now domiciled in South Australia, the Tasmanian-born, Cambridge-educated, author spends large chunks of time in Britain and uses his knowledge of both locales to good advantage in this impressive debut novel. Pre-teen Gerard Freeman, an only child, lives an isolated sort of life in the fictional South Australian town of Mawson. His English mother tells him tales of her childhood in England where she lived in the wonderful mansion called Staplefield with her grandmother Viola Hatherley. Gerard lives for these stories until the day he is caught by his mother rummaging through a drawer which she keeps locked. Gerard finds a manuscript as well as a photograph of an astonishingly beautiful woman in the dress of a former time. Not only is Gerard, who is usually the most cossetted of children, beaten for this offence, the tales of Staplefield, of which he could never hear enough, also cease. Some time after this, when Gerard is 13 and a half, he begins a pen-friendship with an English girl named Alice Jessel. Despite Phyllis Freeman's wishes to the contrary, Gerard corresponds constantly with his 'invisible friend'. A withdrawn child, Gerard finds himself even more alienated from his contemporaries and his mother whom he gladly relinquishes in favour of his paraplegic penfriend. As he grows up, Gerard decides he must travel to England to meet Alice, although she demurs at this, saying she does not wish him to see her as a cripple but she tells him that if ever she regains the power to walk, she wishes him to come to her. Lovelorn, Gerard disregards Alice's wishes and saves his money in order to travel to London. He is unable to meet Alice who does not answer his letters or e-mails but Gerard finds further stories of his great-grandmother, Viola Hatherley, in the British Library. Disappointed and ill, Gerard returns to Australia but is still determined to find the location of Staplefield and solve the mystery of his mother's family. With Alice's help, he is able to cast more light on his enigmatic family and the woman who wrote ghost stories which, alarmingly, have parallels in the history of his relatives . After the death of his mother, Gerard travels once more to London. This time he locates the woman to whom the house he thought of as Staplefield has been left. She requests his help in locating Anne Hatherley, the older and unacknowledged sister of his mother Phyllis. Gerard agrees to help and is given the keys to the old house where he attempts to solve the puzzle of his antecedents. He is shocked, at the same time, to discover that his love, Alice Jessel, may not be as she has portrayed herself. The style of writing of this book can only be described as beautiful. John Harwood acknowledges his debt to Victorian literature, a form which has more depth and beauty than that of today's authors. While his protagonist is, ostensibly, Gerard Freeman, Viola Hatherley and her writing provide the true foundation for the book. The work of Victorian painters is also acknowledged in Mr Harwood's tale although he admits most of the paintings he mentions are as fictional as the story. The conundrum is intricate and the story at times nicely calculated to send shivers of terror rippling down one's spine The character of Gerard is completely convincing. The stories within the novel are very involving and, well, haunting. American readers, do not despair. Although THE GHOST WRITER is so far only released in the UK and Australia , it will be published in the US in July. The author also disclosed that his next novel THE SEANCE, should be completed by the end of 2004. While it is not a direct sequel to THE GHOST WRITER, it is recognisably of the same ilk and, set in Victorian times, employs the same idiom and wonderful language.
Reviewed by Denise Wels Pickles, February 2004
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