Instances of the Number 3 Book + PRICE WATCH * Amazon pricing is not included in price watch

Instances of the Number 3 Book

Salley Vickers' novel Instances of the Number Three is set in London and Shropshire. It describes the relationship between a dead man, his wife and his mistresses and is illuminated by philosophical ponderings on Hamlet and his ghost, and the poetry of Dante, Gerald Manley Hopkins and John Donne. Peter Hansome is the dead husband who walks through the pages of the novel, appearing to his wife Bridget in "his old tweed jacket and cords. He was, in fact, exactly, but without the disfiguring cuts and bruises of the accident, as she had seen him last--in his coffin. "To come to terms with his life and death, literature-loving Bridget makes friends with his mistress, Francis, an ex-artists' model: "She ... had a capacity for stillness and the kind of body which reflects planes of light." But as the omniscient narrator says: This is not an account of feminine jealousy, or even revenge, instead its a story of negotiation and discovery as the characters orbit each other like little planets. Vickers' prose style is witty, literary and decorous, her musing on the instances of the number three take in purgatory, heaven and hell; the eternal lovers triangle and the trinity (memorably described as the "different flavours of a Neapolitan ice"). The book is a controlled meditation on personal identity, passion and art, where emotions are analysed and reconciled. Sally Vickers' trick is to keep you interested in the hearts and lives of the characters as her novel of ideas gently unfurls. This is a fine successor to Vickers' hugely successful debut novel, Miss Garnett's Angel, a subtle story of an older woman's emotional epiphany set in contemporary Venice. --Eithne FarryRead More

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  • Amazon

    Bridget Hansome and Frances Slater have only one thing in common: Peter Hansome, who has died suddenly. Without their husband or lover, the women must rebuild their lives and unravel mysteries that they had never before even suspected. So begins an unlikely alliance between wife and mistress and a voyage of discovery that is comic, yet profound.

  • TheBookPeople

    The fantastic new edition of the bestselling second novel from the author of 'Miss Garnet's Angel'. Bridget Hansome and Frances Slater have only one thing in common. And that's Peter Hansome, who has died suddenly. Without their husband or lover, the women find that before they can rebuild their lives they must look to themselves and unravel mysteries that they had never before even suspected. So begins an unlikely alliance between wife and mistress and a voyage of discovery that is as comic as it is profound. 'Instances of the Number 3' is a funny, beguiling exploration of love, bereavement, Shakespeare, illusion and the impossibility of escaping your past. Following on from 'Miss Garnet's Angel', this brilliant novel confirms Salley Vickers as a writer who transcends generations.

  • 1841156590
  • 9781841156590
  • Salley Vickers
  • 5 March 2007
  • Harper Perennial
  • Paperback (Book)
  • 320
  • (Reissue)
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