Time’s Legacy by Barbara Erskine

A while back I amused myself by writing the following Guide to Life for Barbara Erskine Heroines:

1. If you have a boyfriend, break up with him.

2. If you have a job, take a break from it.

3. This is most usefully combined with a move from London into the country. Preferably to a cottage in the middle of nowhere.

4. When people warn you that the cottage is haunted, take no notice. No rational person believes in ghosts.

5. When you hear loud crashes, smell strange smells or see people who aren’t really there – ignore it. It’s all your imagination.

The Alphabet in Historical Fiction: E is for Erskine

 

‘Joanna.’  Gently he shook her.  ’Joanna, are you hearing me?  I want you to wake up.  When I count three.  Are you ready?  One…two…three…’

Under his hand her head rolled sideways on the matting.  Her eyes were open and unblinking, the pupils dilated.  ’Joanna, do you hear me?  One, two, three.’  As he counted Cohen took her by the shoulders and half lifted her from the floor.  ’Joanna, for the love of God, hear me…’

The panic in the man’s voice galvanised Sam into action.  He dropped on his knees beside them, his fingers feeling rapidly for a pulse in the girl’s throat.

‘Christ!  There’s nothing there!’

This is an extract from one of the most intriguing prologues I’ve ever read.  Normally I skip prologues to novels because I can’t get interested in characters in jeopardy until I know a bit more about them.  Not this time!

The novel is Lady of Hay by Barbara Erskine.  It opens in Edinburgh in 1970. College student Joanna Clifford has agreed to be put under hypnosis as part of a university research project into past life regression.  The researchers, Dr Cohen and Sam Franklyn, get a bit more than they bargained for when Jo, reliving her own traumatic death, almost dies again.  She revives but not before Dr Cohen has implanted a post-hypnotic suggestion: Jo will remember nothing of what has happened, will allow herself to be regressed again and will then relive all the events of her past life.

Fifteen years later Jo is living in London, a freelance journalist, involved in a tempestuous relationship with Sam’s brother Nick – and planning to be hypnotised as part of her research for an article on regression. She has no idea how dangerous that could be.

Tuesday Teaser: Midnight is a Lonely Place by Barbara Erskine

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

This week’s teaser is from a favourite re-read, Midnight is a Lonely Place by Barbara Erskine.  Kate Kennedy retires to a remote cottage on the Essex coast to work on her biography of Byron.  But she soon discovers she may not be alone…

It was as she put her hand to the light switch that she realised there was someone in the room.  Her mouth went dry.  She held her breath, listening, aware that the other person was doing the same thing, painfully conscious that she was standing silhouetted against the bright light of the hall.

It was a woman.

This is not one I read last thing at night – not unless I want to sleep with the light on!  Barbara Erskine scared herself when she wrote this book, as she says in an extract from this interview:

When I started writing Midnight is a Lonely Place, which I think is probably the scariest of my books, my desk was actually against the window, looking out, with my back to the room. By the time I′d finished the book I was right over the other side of the room, with my back against the wall. I felt so uncomfortable I kept thinking, ′Well, I′ll rearrange it a little bit …′ until I ended up in the corner where nothing could creep up on me unseen!