Early in The Ghost Variations, the third novel by Damian Lanigan, the narrator approaches a woman in a bar to ask her a question: “Would you mind if I played the piano a little? I’ll be quiet. And I’ll be good. I’ll be quietly good.”
Quietly good: the phrase aptly describes this accomplished book about love, grief and the constraining and consoling effects of art. Declan Byrnie grew up in a family with Irish roots in working-class Manchester, but his prodigious gifts as a classical pianist transported him to a lavish world of concert halls and oligarchs’ homes. He was at the height of his fame when his wife, Esther, died in mysterious circumstances during a hiking trip; bereft, he disappeared from the music scene for four years. We meet Byrnie as he prepares for what, having been coaxed by his agent to perform again before adoring audiences and a prurient media, he sardonically calls the “Dead Wife Tour”.
