Stoberock’s lyrical book of friendship

Isabel Grady, the protagonist of Johanna Stoberock’s first novel City of Ghosts, has to make one of the most difficult decisions a person could be asked to make. She must choose between the two people she loves most: her husband Danny and her best friend Anna.

When the book begins, Anna is devastated by the death of her brother Matthew and plans a year-long trip around the world to ease her grief. Isabel helps Anna plan the trip, and both women meet Danny the man who will lead Anna’s mountain trek in Nepal. Anna and Danny begin dating and plan to reunite in Nepal one year later. However, within a few short months, Isabel finds herself married to Danny and living in the unfamiliar and exotic city of Kathmandu.

As Isabel struggles to reconstruct her life, she reveals pieces of her past, including her unfamiliarity with the man she has married, her fears about betraying Anna, and her long relationship with Anna’s brother Matthew. Eventually, Anna arrives in Nepal and Isabel’s confusion increases when Anna creates a love triangle that threatens the new life Isabel has created for herself.

Stoberock’s prose is flowery, and her description is heavy at times. (How many times does she need to mention that Danny ‘smelled of nutmeg’?) Overall, however, her writing flows smoothly, painting rich images of Kathmandu that give the reader a heightened sense of perception. The descriptions of the city’s oppressive heat, the strange sounds and the perpetual layer of dust reinforce Isabel’s feelings of displacement, confusion and isolation.

Isabel’s story tells her coming-of-age, as she steps out of her best friend’s shadow and starts living her own life. Her narrative thanks to Stoberock’s careful, lyrical writing is a beautifully engaging tale about grief, love, identity, and the strengths and limitations of friendship.