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Family Secrets Blown Open: ‘The Moon Always Rising’
A novel that transports the reader to a seaside getaway — with a ghost
In the newly released novel The Moon Always Rising, a Scottish businesswoman, Els, travels to the island of Nevis in the West Indies for a getaway. She ends up reconnecting with the mother she never really knew, while also befriending a ghost.
The author, Alice C. Early, has been a seasonal visitor to Nevis for decades, so the setting and the speech of the residents are based in large part on her experiences there, as well as on her research. The scenes have a lilting, dreamy quality. In her language, even a violent storm has its own beauty.
“The closed shutters couldn’t keep out the explosions of lightning, or the thunder that followed almost immediately. Half three in the morning, dark as pitch, and the world was an undulating roar broken by earsplitting crashes and the ripping and slapping of roof shakes. A scream of wood wrenching loose, nails losing their purchase, fibers separating, then a crash of timbers on the patio.
She’d dozed off reading a history of Nevis, leaving a precious candle to burn out. Chiding herself for wasting the light, she threw off her blanket, stood up, and pawed the table for the matches and a new candle stub. Her shadow jittered on…
