Review: The Persistence of Spirits
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 29, 2014
New York author T. Wrage fulfills her passion for writing with this well constructed novel THE BED AND BREAKFAST, her fourth novel: as she states, `the drive and desire to create places and characters with depth, where readers can go and escape the hardships that life sometimes thrusts upon them is my greatest aspiration.'In this novel T. Wrage creates a story whose main character is actually a place - the Victorian style 100+ year old elegant home built by a doctor and boasts seven bedroom suites, two on each floor, has gained the sheen of a well tendered antique through the years and is now a Bed and Breakfast, the Discovery Inn. Wrage describes the house in detail before introducing the owner and the house tenders who make this a most desirable Vermont escape for couples - a place where many people come to find solace, romance, and peaceful tranquility, which they find easily within the walls designed with comfort in mind fill its promises. There is a delightful hitch: the spirit of the deceased Doctor Watson remains in the house, not a frightful spirit but a congenial `host'. Wrage introduces the guests room by room with just enough history to make them credible and early on allows the house ghost/spirit to enter the story with another bit of history: "It was the coldest day on record for a December that anyone could remember, when a figure of a man appeared in the home of the deceased Doctor Watson. His wife who survives him stated, "He appeared right in front of me as though he were still alive, I stood there stunned and he reached out to me, as I fell to my knees in disbelief, he disappeared as quickly as he had shown himself." Perry [the current owner] looked up from the clipping and added, "This was the first encounter with the good doctor and from this day on, he has continued to be seen in the house, we really do not know why he continues to dwell here, we only know he does."Basically this is a romance novel that deals with the daily routines of the visiting guests and their interactions both with each other and with the other guests, but there is a mystery afoot that involves the spirit(s) and that is the driving force that makes T. Wrage's novel takes flight. She manages to invite the reader into the atmosphere she has so carefully described so that the arrival of the new spirit (and the tale of murder) holds the well-prepared attention until the mystery is manifest. This is a solid little book, not in the class with the Great American Novel, but on that will most assuredly provide the reader with an enthralling adventure for those quiet nights of curling up with a good book. Grady Harp, January 14