Are you haunted by the past?
We’re always told not to focus on or live in the past and yet our history has created us and shapes what our future may hold. Natalie, the main character of Arm Farm, is haunted by the image of her murdered parents and uses that mystery to propel her in her forensic science studies.
Some say they don’t believe in ghosts but no matter what form they take for you the apparitions of our ancestors are existent. Sciences cannot explain away our feelings; that shiver we get when a grandparents name or favourite meal is mentioned or the sudden drop in temperature right before we fall the same way a deceased friend did.
Ghosts may wear sheets or clothes because that’s what we want them disguised as. Seeing an ancestor naked after their death is not so possible if we don’t know what they looked like naked in life. Deep down a lot of us want to believe but are nervous to admit it. Instead we read about haunted castles, fictional mysteries and try to talk ourselves out of that weird deja vu feeling when we say something.
Our pasts are disguised in some way or another. Whether you believe it’s in an out of body experience or an animal, spirits of what once was still surround us and it’s up to us to accept that.
I’m not saying stop reading the mystery stories, there are great ones which provide comfort like Natalie’s story of achievement based on tragedy and they all give us something to learn from.
So go now and get that book you were nervous about buying and look around you, you’ll see a ghost of someone you new.
Happy Halloween and reading!
Sarah Butland
author of Arm Farm
