Your writer, in conjuring this tale of murder, adultery, incest, ghosts, redemption and remorse, takes you first to a daffodil-filled garden in Highgate, North London, where, just outside the kitchen window, something startling shimmers on the very...
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Your writer, in conjuring this tale of murder, adultery, incest, ghosts, redemption and remorse, takes you first to a daffodil-filled garden in Highgate, North London, where, just outside the kitchen window, something startling shimmers on the very edges of perception. Fluttering and chattering, these are our kehua - a whole multiplying flock of Maori spirits (all will be explained) goaded into wakefulness by the conversation within. Scarlet - a long-legged, skinny young woman of the new world order - has announced to Beverley - her aged grandmother - that she intends to leave home and husb
Cover; Praise for Chalcot Crescent; Copyright; Preface; Kehua!; PART ONE; Scarlet blows the gaff; Where they live; In the basement; Running into a trap; Down in the basement; Scarlet's plan for leaving home; Back to the basement; In the kitchen at Robinsdale; Murder in the family; A break for lunch; The first murder: a set piece; Jackson too is in a rush; Beverley talks about her will; Night in the basement; Now, about Louis; Scarlet washes Beverley's hair; Louis thinks it over too; In the basement; Run, Lola, run; Lola's move to Nopasaran; Would Louis mind?; At home with Cynara
Understanding Louis betterAnother place, another time; Down here writing; Beverley feels better; What Lola is doing in the meanwhile; What happened next, in that other country long ago; A friend from Glastonbury drops by; What Beverley does when Scarlet leaves; Beverley, Gerry and Fiona; Down here writing; Louis at work when Beverley's call is put through; How Jackson is getting on; What Jackson did next; Things are not working out in the basement; PART TWO; Beverley, pre-pubertal; Lola, pre-pubertal; Beverley at Fifteen; Beverley at sixteen; Beverley's seventeenth birthday party
Holding briefA drunken scene in Coromandel; Dido and Aeneas; The night before she ran; But it wasn't…; Beverley at nineteen; Beverley at thirty; Beverley at thirty-four; Beverley at thirty-five; Underpinnings; Back to Beverley, and sanity; Beverley and Gerry, an interlude; A conversation between Marcus and Beverley; Let's get out of here; PART THREE; Enchanted Scarlet; Lola waits for Louis; Alice's mysterious pregnancy; The peace and quiet of the basement; And now for something completely different; D'Dora leaving home; D'Dora digs Alice out of her hole; After the row was over
Alice prepares to leave Lakeside ChaseOut in the garden; The convergence of the clan, the convening of the whanau; But Gerry is coming; The gathering of the kehua; Down in the basement; Another's day's writing; The cleansing of Robinsdale; Scarlet's brush with death; Glossary;
