Ghost at the Table by Suzanne Berne

Cynthia Fiske lives a comfortable single life in San Francisco writing young-adult historical books. Her older sister, Frances, is an interior designer who lives and works in Concord, Massachusetts. Frances convinces Cynthia to come to Concord to spend the Thanksgiving holiday. Since Cynthia is writing a book about the daughters of Mark Twain and a visit to his home in Hartford would be helpful, she agrees to share her holiday with her sister.

For Frances, this holiday would be their last chance to make amends with their 82-year-old father who recently suffered a stroke. His much younger wife is divorcing him and he is not able to cope on his own. Cynthia has not had any contact with her father for years because she is convinced he is responsible for the poisoning death of their invalid mother decades before. The holiday starts on a sour note and the rest of the festivities go downhill from there. The sisters battle with painful memories, each convinced of the correctness of their recollections.

In an interesting twist, Berne parallels the Fiske sisters with the daughters of Mark Twain. As the story unfolds, the reader is forced to take sides in this tale of a modern dysfunctional family.


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