Who by Fire

In Who by Fire, Mary L. Tabor offers a beautifully-wrought tale of love, mourning, and betrayal. The narrative is related by a widower named Robert whose wife, Lena, had been engaged in an extramarital affair shortly before her death. Grieving over the death of his wife and heartsick over her extramarital affair, Robert attempts to reconstruct the last months of Lena’s life so that he can better understand not only the decisions she made but also his own role in those decisions. What emerges is a rich tapestry that illustrates all of the ways in which the eternal quest for love and understanding manifests itself–our hunger for love, our desire to please, our triumphs and failures. Needless to say, a narrative of this nature calls for emotionally complex and compelling characters, and Tabor rises to the occasion. Robert’s quest to discover the “true” Lena leads him not only on a concurrent quest of self-discovery, but also to recognize the full humanity of everyone involved in her affair–including her lover, Isaac, and her lover’s wife, Evan. And while the journey to forgiveness is certainly not easy for Robert, it is both fulfilling and heartrending. An excellent tale of love, longing, betrayal, and ultimately forgiveness.