Evocatively set in California’s vineyard-covered Napa Valley (whose backdrop of the wine-making world and its cycles gives the book its dreamy, elegiac tone), ‘Lost in the Forest’ tells of the effect of John Albermarle’s untimely death on his wife, small son and teenage stepdaughters – as well as on the wife’s first husband, who discovers that he is becoming increasingly attracted to her again.

Perhaps the most likeable character in the novel (although he’s already dead when it begins), John is a serious and kind-hearted man, beloved of those around him. His death sends the family reeling with grief, even though each member will have to cope with it in his or her own distinctive and personal way. Eva, the widow, finds herself dealing with the unfathomable despair of losing the man she adored and who showed her the way into a respectful, companionable marriage. Theo, barely a toddler when horror strikes, must come to terms with the notion of death and the closure and finality it implies. Emily, the eldest stepdaughter, basking in the glow of social success, is perhaps too immersed in her exciting projects to give herself true time to mourn; while for surly Daisy, an awkward and ungainly girl struggling with self-hatred, the passing of John removes a source of both sympathy and security. On the cusp of sexual awakening, she will be drawn into an unhealthy secret life and caught in the spell of a twisted, cynical man using her for his own purposes.

And, as John’s family is thus engaged in understanding and overcoming pain, Mark, ex-husband and father, must grapple with his wish to make up for his shortcomings as a parent and his growing desire for the woman he was once married to.

‘Lost in the Forest’ makes for compelling reading, while allowing us a very close look into a human circle disrupted by miscommunication and tragedy.

Laura Chalar is a 29-year-old poet-cum-lawyer from Uruguay, South America (currently living in Buenos Aires, Argentina). Her first book of poetry was published in Montevideo in 2005. She is in charge of the poetry section of the Uruguayan literary magazine Letra Nueva, where she also publishes book reviews and articles, and of the cultural section of the community periodical La Farola, where she contributes reviews and articles on literary and historical issues. In 2006 she will be a guest editor of Versal magazine.

© 2006 Laura Hird All rights reserved.