The Ancestral Suitcase

E. Jane Philipps is head of the Biology Library at Queen’s University
in Kingston.

This challenging but eminently readable novel by award-winning author
Sylvia Fraser blends mystery and romance, time travel and the
supernatural, historical fiction and modern psychological drama. The
result is a complex work of broad appeal that rewards both casual and
analy-tic readings.

English professor Nora Locke is about to journey to the English
Midlands to complete her research on D.H. Lawrence, when her mother dies
and she is obliged to return to Hamilton to settle her affairs.
Strangely, her mother’s death occurs on her own birthday, which is
also the anniversary of her fabled grandmother’s death. Nora’s
discovery of a battered suitcase, dated 1913, from her grandmother’s
Midlands hometown of Barrow inspires the idea of a side trip, and
provides the motivating force for everything that follows.

Nora arrives in Barrow with the ancestral suitcase. She awakens the
following day, her passport missing and her wardrobe eerily transformed,
to find herself in the year 1913. The richly painted world of the past,
peopled by a host of vibrant characters with intricately intertwined
storylines, becomes the vehicle for Nora’s exploration of the emotions
and memories that have haunted and shaped her. As the novel progresses,
the links between past and present become both enriched and transparent.
Highly recommended.