A man in a coma. A dream-world built from memory and longing. And one dying father figure's last, unexpected act of love — a gift that changes everything.
"A playful psychological novel that reframes life's hardest moments as opportunities for healing."
Foreword Clarion Reviews
Something terrible happened to Josh Bencet when he was ten years old. He's never spoken of it — not to his wife Jackie, not even to Henri, the Dutch immigrant who became the father Josh never had. For decades, the silence has held.
Then Henri is dying — and asks Josh to look after his things. A simple enough request. Until it isn't. Josh's attempt to comply triggers a massive, unexpected reaction that leaves him in a coma.
For two weeks, Josh withdraws into a dream state no one can penetrate. He enters AfterL — a dimension only frequented in dreams and fantasy, where time and space are like a child's playthings: mutable, manageable, infinitely elastic. Here, the past is his only contact with reality. And the ghosts of that past have been waiting a very long time to be heard.
Henri's Last Gift is a story about what it costs to stay closed — and what becomes possible when you finally let the past speak. With cinematic imagination and deep emotional honesty, it is the kind of novel that stays with you long after the last page.
Readers of Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist, Richard Bach's Jonathan Livingston Seagull, and Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet in Heaven will find familiar territory here — a literary journey that uses the fantastical to illuminate what is most profoundly human.
Interactions with his parents are conveyed in intimate, subtle terms… the descriptions of AfterL are entertaining and imaginative. A playful psychological novel that reframes life's hardest moments as opportunities for healing.
Foreword Clarion Reviews
Independent literary review publication
Jaitour's take on life after death is detailed and refreshing. A fascinating novel about a much-talked-about but little-known subject.
Sheila Martindale
Former poetry editor, Canadian Author & past editor, Island Writer
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