The Obituary Writer

On the morning of 18 January, The Obituary Writer found me. Sometimes you find a book. Sometimes a book finds you.

I was walking up the ramp of the library, and as usual, I would have a quick glance at what's recommended at the bend before the start of the ramp. And it caught my eye.

The title was unusual enough. And a black and white image of a lady seated at her desk in the most leisurely manner - the obituary writer - drew me. It beckoned and I answered the call.

Beyond a love story of two women set in different eras amid very unusual and trying circumstances, the book tells the story of loss. Of parents who lost their children, of a man who lost his wife and baby at the delivery room, of wives who lost their husbands, of a woman whose lover moved on and got on with his life, and of a woman who waited 13 years for a man who may not even be alive.

Vivien lost David in the San Francisco earthquake. Not knowing if he even survived the quake, she waited, searched, concocted stories in her mind to explain his disappearance and hoped for 13 years.

By sheer serendipity, she became a obituary writer who brought comfort to those in grief through words that flowed from her pen. Words and phrases that bring meaning to the lives of the dead - regardless of how short - even to infants who are robbed of the chance to gasp even a breath of air in this earthly world. By doing so, she also helped herself cope with the loss of her David.

She is only too familiar with how the utterance of the name of the deceased can break those in grief  and send them choking with tears; how when someone you love dies, after some time, no one listens anymore despite how much you want to talk about them; and how, simply, tea and toast always comfort those in grief.

After 13 long years, when she finally found that the man she loved is indeed forever gone, and she finally moved on.

Her story is cleverly intertwined with that of Claire, her daughter-in-law, torn between her lover and husband. Jolted by the death of a neighbour, she realised that nothing is safe and nothing stays the same. And so, she sought a lover who represented a departure from the safe and stable live she had chosen to live with her husband.

Their stories unravelled and come full circle in their final conversation in the hospital, almost at Vivien's deathbed.

"But shouldn't we hold on to our dreams?" Claire asked, almost desperate.

"Not when they keep us from moving forward," Vivien said, sadly.



- The weight of her memories kept her in place, unable to move forward -