'Genius premise ... characters you won't want to leave behind.'
A suspenseful story in the vein of Life After Life. Carol is a gifted pianist who has never needed anything but her talent β until a mysterious injury forces her to stop playing and she has to confront an empty existence. She begins to see glimpses of her next life, Andreq. Is he really what he seems to be? And can he help Carol learn to live her life now?
'Reminded me of The End of Mr Y by Scarlett Thomas (one of my Top Shelf Authors = I Want To Write Like That.)'
'Reminded me of Doris Lessingβthough Morris is much more readable.'
'The ideas are fresh, the plot unpredictable, the characters interesting; I was entirely engaged and convinced. I liked the writing very much, with its story within a story having echoes of Atwood's 'Blind Assassin'.
'Distinct voice reminded me of Atwood's Handmaid's Tale.'
'Having read Hilary Mantel's Beyond Black, which also explores the murky lives of charlatans, I was intrigued by the subject. What I got was a first class page-turner.'
'I was reminded of Iain Banks; London is a gritty, grave place, where to step off the treadmill can leave one on the outside.'
'Reminded me at first of The Time Traveller's wife; strong imagery and layers of story within a story. However it grew into something quite different.'
'Gave me the creepy feeling of Rosemary's Baby or the Wicker Man'
'Like John Fowles's The Magus ... the sort of literature I enjoy reading .. an unsettling plot with hints of more beyond. Not the depressing realism of your typical Booker novelist or the light fluffiness of middle class city life.'
'Like Murakami's Hard-Boiled Wonderland, although this book uses its double narrative in a more straightforward fashion (which I appreciate).'
'I have had to wrestle with monsters of professional jealousy to review this book. It is SO good.'
'Reminds me of the canny cultural observations of Barbara Pym or Penelope Fitzgerald. Prepare to be surprised, mystified, and sorry it ends.'
'Not easily categorised. Should I call it a literary novel? Science Fiction? Romance? You could make a case for any one.'
'Excellent. Will read it again soon.'
'I was always fascinated by tales of regression to past lives,' says the author Roz Morris. 'I thought, what if instead of going to the past, someone went to a future life? Who would do that? Why? What would they find?
'Another longtime interest was the world of the classical musician. Musical scores are exacting and dictatorial - you play a note for perhaps a sixth of a second and not only that, there are instructions for how to feel - expressivo, amoroso. It's as if you don't play a piece of classical music; you channel the spirit of the composer.
'I became fascinated by a character who routinely opened her entire soul to the most emotional communications of classical composers. And I thought, what if she couldn't do it any more? And then, what if I threw her together with someone who could trap the part of her that responded so completely to music?'
My Memories of a Future Life is a new addition to the great tradition of the 'who was I' tale for readers of Cloud Atlas, Somewhere In Time, Vertigo, Lady of Hay and The Blind Assassin.