Two stories run parallel to each other in this novel, only merging towards the end when the boy becomes a man and the woman learns to face her ghosts.
Hungry Ghosts is based in part on the true story of an 11-year-old boy who had never been to school and was discovered living in an overgrown house in the Home Countries.
Martin and Sylvia meet when she gives up her hospital job and buys a derelict cottage on the Greek island of Crete. Sylvia, who has moved to the Aegean in an effort to purify her body after a series of miscarriages, hopes that the clean air will help her conceive. She intends to build a modern house on the land but Martin, a builder, gradually convinces her to restore the cottage and learn to accept its limitations.
A well-crafted novel with a moving conclusion.
Hungry Ghosts, Debbie Taylor, (Penguin, £6.99)
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