Lost

In this third novel by the acclaimed bestselling author of "Wicked" and "Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister", famed children's book author Winifred Rudge travels to London to research a book about a woman who is being haunted by Jack the Ripper. Winifred Rudge, a bemused writer struggling to get beyond the runaway success of her mass-market astrology book, travels to London to jump-start her new novel about a woman who is being haunted by the ghost of Jack the Ripper. Upon her arrival, she finds that her stepcousin and old friend John Comestor has disappeared, and a ghostly presence seems to have taken over his home. Is the spirit Winnie's great-great-grandfather, who, family legend claims, was Charles Dickens's childhood inspiration for Ebenezer Scrooge? Could it be the ghostly remains of Jack the Ripper? Or a phantasm derived from a more arcane and insidious origin? Winnie begins to investigate and finds herself the unwilling audience for a drama of specters and shades -- some from her family's peculiar history and some from her own unvanquished past. In the spirit of A.S. Byatt's Possession, with dark echoing overtones of A Christmas Carol, Lost presents a rich fictional world that will enrapture its readers.-- Provided by publisher

Includes an excerpt from Son of a witch.

Includes 'Readers' Discussion Guide'.

Machine generated contents note: Stave One: -- Somebody Else in the Vehicle -- 1 -- Stave Two: -- At the Flat in Weatherall Walk -- 37 -- Stave Three: -- From the Chimney Inside the Chimney -- 117 -- Stave Four: -- As Dante in the Purgatorio -- 191 -- Stave Five: -- For the Time Being -- 303 -- Acknowledgments -- 337.