Remembering the Bones

by Frances Itani

Georgina Danforth Witley shares her birthday – April 21, 1926 – with Queen Elizabeth II, a coincidence that has led to an invitation to a special 80th birthday lunch at Buckingham Palace. But Georgie has a car accident on her way to the airport, and she now lies injured in a ravine not far from her own home. Desperately hopeful that someone will find her, she relies on her strength, her family memories, her no-nonsense wit and a recitation of the names of the bones in her body- a long-forgotten exercise from childhood that reminds her she is still very much alive.

(From Publisher).

Frances Itani is the author of Deafening, which won a Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book and was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her short story collection, Poached Egg on Toast, won the Ottawa Book Award and the CAA Jubilee Award for Best Collection of Stories. She was recently made a member of the Order of Canada. Frances Itani lives in Ottawa.

In this well-written book, the author explores a life which on the surface is quite ordinary but which in reality has meaning and resonance.