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'Next Life Might Be Kinder': A Tale Of Love, Grief And Denial

Author Howard Norman.

In the early 1970s, Sam Lattimore and Elizabeth Church met in an art gallery in Halifax, Nova Scotia. They fell for each other and married and moved into a hotel, where, less than a year into their marriage, Elizabeth was murdered by a bellman who had become obsessed with her.

But though Elizabeth dies, she doesn’t leave her husband—not completely. She returns to him at night on a beach on a regular basis not far from a new place he’s rented. That’s the premise of the new novel by Howard Norman. Next Life Might Be Kinder is a novel about grief, love and perhaps even Sam Lattimore’s dreaded word, “closure.” Howard Norman is the author of several novels, including The Bird Artist and The Northern Lights, and a memoir, I Hate to Leave this Beautiful Place.

VPR's Peter Biello speaks with Howard Norman about his new novel.

Broadcast on Wednesday, June 18, 2014 at 7:49 a.m.

 

Peter was a Producer/Announcer at VPR until 2015. He began his public radio career in 2007 at WHQR-FM in Wilmington, North Carolina where he served as Morning Edition host and reporter, covering county government and Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base. His work has won several Associated Press awards and has appeared on NPR's All Things Considered, Weekend Edition, and PRI's This American Life. A graduate of the creative writing program at the University of Maine at Farmington, Peter enjoys writing, cooking and traveling.
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