Since, her debut, Alice Hoffman has become one of the famous writers. She is read greatly in America. She is the author of 16 novels. She has also contributed 2 short story collections and around 8 books to the world of literature. Her novels ‘Aquamarine‘ and ‘Practical magic‘ has also been made into films. Her novels are mostly among the lists of notable books by the New York Times, the People magazine and the Library Journals. And now she is out with her latest book ‘Skylight Confessions‘. It spins weaving a tale of a family. We find some elements of Greek tragedy in here too. I found it to be an emotional one, but it has been gracefully crafted.
In the opening chapter we meet Arlyn attending to her father’s funeral. When John Moody asks her for directions, fate take its chance and gets Arlyn in the web. Arlyn takes him to be her only destiny and they get married. And then, fate unfolds its cruel intentions. Arlyn dies as a result of breast cancer, as unexpectedly as it came to the writer. But Arlyn leaves behind her, a small daughter, Blanca, and a young son, Sam. After her death, Sam’s relations with his father get strained, instead of improving. And later on, he turns out to be a drug addict.
But Arlyn’s ghost returns. However, it seems that Arlyn’s ghost is more interested in her husband than her troubled child. The author says that she is influenced by ‘Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s- One Hundred Years of Solitude‘. I think, now we have a reason. She has also been influenced by ‘The Twilight Zone‘. According to the author ‘It’s about three different weddings, and three different weddings in different time periods, and they’re all interrelated, and some of them go right and some of them go wrong’. “It’s really about the search for love and ... how you know if someone’s the right person or the wrong person,’ she added.
To some degree, I think she gives hints of her own experiences in her novels. And for a fact she has done that well.
