Emily & Virginia — Robert McDowell

This is a coming-of-age novel in which Emily Dickinson & Virginia Woolf return to this world and join forces to protect & assist a young woman artist, Lily, as she grows into her full power in love & work. Artfully written to appeal to adults and younger readers of serious literary fiction, the story takes place almost entirely in Ashland, Oregon and features appearances by several of the leg-endary Bloomsbury group, including Virginia's sister, Vanessa Bell and husband, Leonard, as well as Emily's sister Lavinia. The Mother Goddess of Ireland, Brigid, appears in an early segment. She grants Virginia's peti-tion to return to this realm to help Lily and it is she who also decides to send Emily Dickinson with her. Readers of Emily's poems and Virginia's To the Lighthouse, which this novel structurally mirrors, will discover added delight in echoes and allusions to the lives and works of these great writers.