What happens when you die but your spirit decides to linger on? It is from this vantage point of ‘the between’, that Raziela Nolan recounts her life in New Orleans in the 1920s.
Razi was anticipating going to medical school, participated in the subversive movement of dissemination of information on birth control and had a passionate love affair with Andrew O’Connell but all was cut short after a poolside accident.
Raziela could have gone beyond but her spirit lingers to watch and meddle a bit. Along the way she learns that there are rules for those who are in ‘the between’ such as don’t touch and stay away from your loved ones. But Raziela can’t stop wanting to find out what happened to Andrew.
Her desire to know more intensifies as she happens upon a young married couple many years later experiencing some martial problems of their own. I like how she is playful with them, moving books or making small sounds.
As she helps the young couple reconnect she also is closer to finding out what happened with Andrew. Ronlyn Domingue does an exceptional job of going back and forth with the characters, and from the 1920s to the present.
I liked Domingue’s concept of ‘the between’ and Razi’s guides and encounters in ‘the between’ were also charming. The book did make me tear up a bit for it’s beautiful love story and it’s fiercely independent narrator. Razi always said that one life wasn’t enough and in a way she got her wish.
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