Three and a Half Deaths by Emma Donoghue

Three and a Half Deaths

by Emma Donoghue

An accident, a suicide, an act of criminal negligence . . . and a near-death experience. The short stories in Emma Donoghue's Three and a Half Deaths – set in France, the USA and Canada – bring together calamities from two centuries.

'What the Driver Saw' is inspired by a freak accident on Nice's Promenade des Anglais, the 1920s equivalent of Princess Diana's last ride through Paris.

'The Trap' takes us to New York, 1878, when a woman at the centre of a public scandal decides that she's finally had enough.

Any thinking about death must of course include its lingering effects on the living; 'Sissy' explores the guilt and culpability of a woman whose young sister died in the 1840s in London, Ontario.

Finally, 'Fall' is about an incident at Niagara Falls in 1901 when a middle-aged schoolteacher staked her whole future on an act so daring it could be called suicidal. A near-death, a sort of rebirth: the kind of moment that makes visible the discreet courage it takes to live a whole life.

Reviewed by brokentune on

4 of 5 stars

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So, just when I decided that Three and a Half Deaths would be my last Donoghue ever (simply because it is the last of her books I have on my kindle), she pulls four short stories out of the bag that I really enjoyed reading:

What the Driver Saw - set in the south of France in the 1920s and based on a true story.

The Trap - set in New York in the 1870s and telling of a crime, but who committed it?

Sissy - set in London, Ontario, describing the effect of the death of a family member.

Fall - set at Niagara Falls in 1901 tells of bravery or is it recklessness?

All four stories are of different styles, different eras and predicaments, but all have death at the heart of the story.

Maybe there is hope for me and Donoghue's books, yet?

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 4 March, 2016: Finished reading
  • 4 March, 2016: Reviewed