Dead Man's Embers is a wonderful piece of storytelling, rich in atmosphere and full of characters that leap from the page. It is a gripping and moving portrait of a society emerging from the shadow of war, and of Non Davies, an unforgettable woman out of kilter with her time.
In the aftermath of the Great War, Non Davies wakes one morning to find her husband crouching underneath the kitchen table in a cold sweat, shouldering an imaginary rifle. What has changed her Davey so completely? A clue arrives inside a mysterious letter, which takes her to London in search of the answer. When she returns home, Non finds that the dark secrets of Davey's past are working their way ever closer to the surface. She has to summon all her courage and compassion to restore her beloved husband and guard the fragile happiness of her war-weary village.
'With discernment and tenderness, Mari Strachan traces the Davies family's slow journey towards recovery over the course of a long, hot summer...[The novel's] fire takes hold and burns deep' - Literary Review
Author
About Mari Strachan
Mari Strachan has been immersed in books all her life. She has worked as a librarian in academic, school, public, private and prison libraries. She has also been a book reviewer, researcher, translator, copy writer and web editor. She and her husband live part-time on a tiny smallholding in the hills of Ceredigion, West Wales, and part-time on a narrowboat on the Grand Union Canal in London, where much of The Earth Hums in B Flat was written.
