The Words for Her
Hold up your phone to take a photo and some people won’t be there. Look for them in older images and their bodies are gaps, the rest of the photo still busy around them. People have stopped appearing in photographs. First a handful, then many more. Does this new, troubling group pose a threat?
From their home in Whakatāne, Jodie Pascoe and her daughter Jade watch as the number of gaps grows. While protecting Jade, Jodie searches for a friend from the past, Miri, who will help her navigate the collapsing present.
The Words for Her is an arresting story about how photographs bind us together and what happens when those binds fall away.
You can order a copy of The Words for Her from Lawrence & Gibson, or buy a copy from your local bookseller (distributed in Aotearoa only).
“If you are going to read one novel this year, make it this one. The Words for Her is a master class in blending intriguing and intelligent ideas about images and words with the realist grit of surviving as a solo parent in a small provincial town; complete with a twist of dystopia and societal collapse. ”
“...The Words For Her kind of blew my mind. It’s an exercise in making us think about semiotics: about how words are images and how they too can memorialise, commemorate and illuminate. What are written records if not ways to see? ”