EARL MCKENZIE

Author McKenzie invites the reader into the network of rooms to which his protagonist, David Richmond, retires at the end of each day in search of rest, refreshment and quiet reflection. And they speak to us, divulging the nuggets that Richmond has mined from the experiences of his life. These are Richmond's memories of his life which has been a network of these rooms: "They know the patterns of my sleep. They have listened to my conversations. These rooms have witnessed my long labours. They have seen the day s experiences on my face at the end of each day. These are my memories of some of these rooms. I am putting them together like an ageing author compiling his selected poems, stories or essays, or like a painter putting together pieces for his retrospective exhibition. I am like an artist composing a mosaic from the fragments of my life. In fact, this book is like a mural composed of twelve mosaic panels you could call it a doztych. I am like a philosopher seeking meaning in the pattern of these negative and positive spaces. I will leave out those I passed through quickly, those that are not linked to significant periods in my life, and those that I would rather forget...." The rooms of preferred forgetting have no place in this story. So this is not an autobiography in the ordinary sense of the word. It is more the story of a man counting his rooms, like a collector his relics, or a supplicant his rosary beads or shall I say a miser counting his coins? Your life story is your best asset, for there is nothing in the world that is more truly yours. These, therefore, are some of the nuggets the author's protagonist has dug up from the soil of his experience. He invites the reader to join him as he holds them up to the light to better examine them.