Losing Gemma door Katy Gardner

TITLE Losing Gemma
AUTHOR Katy Gardner
PUBLISHER Riverhead Books
1ST PUBLICATION 2002
NUMBER OF PAGES 307
GENRE Thriller

SETTING

The story starts with a preface, that part takes place when Gemma is just dead. Namely at her funeral. So that would have taken place at approximately page 220. The story is a flashback from Esther. In this flashback she made some other flashbacks. The flashback is told in chronological order, beside the few flashbacks she make in the flashback. There are also a few parts which are told by Gemma. In the flashback she make a time jump of 5 years. The flashback starts in 1989.

Most of time, the story takes place in India. At different places, because Gemma and Esther were backpackers. The preface takes place at the funeral of Gemma.

MAIN CHARACTERS DESCRIPTION

The main characters of the book are Esther and Gemma: Esther is a smart and pretty girl. She’s very confident about everything and she often gets things the way she wants. She is graduated and wants to travel to India for some adventure. She thinks she knows Gemma very well, but she’s wrong. Gemma is an inconfident girl who isn’t that pretty as Esther. She is not graduated, but quite smart though. Gemma is less competitive than Esther. She is not adventurous at all, but still dares to join Esther on her backpacking holiday to India. Look for more information to my reading log

OPINION

I read this book quite quickly. I found it to be a real page turner and saying to myself, one more chapter before I turn off the light. I really did. Because you knew that Gemma dies it was page turning in the sense that you wanted to know HOW she died. A great read. I'd read another of Katy Gardner's books...

I highly recommend this book!

SUMMARY

Two girls, Esther and Gemma, friends since childhood, went to India on a backpacking holiday. Before they went on holiday Gemma had met a boy. She had a crush on him. But Esther also liked the boy and had an affair with him. The boy loved Esther too, and not Gemma. Esther didn’t tell it Gemma, but out of guilt she took Gemma with her to India. In India they met Coral and she travelled with them. Esther didn’t like her much, but Gemma and Coral were soon good friends. A few times they went away without Coral, but Coral always found them again. They went to Agun Mazir, a little village. This place is best known as the site of the shrine of Pir Saheb Nirulla, a Sufi mystic who is said to have burnt to death there in 1947.There all the mysterious things started. Coral starts behaving strangely, Gemma gets a fever and Esther gets illusions. Esther stops trusting Coral, she didn’t want to leave Gemma alone with Coral but she had to get medicine for Gemma. She went to the village, but there was no store open. She wanted to go out of this village. She wanted to take Gemma with her and leave Coral. She did not trust the situation at all. She told Gemma and Gemma told her that she had to go without her. Gemma didn’t even want Esther around anymore. She said she found out about her and Steve. Esther went away alone. She first went back to their safe-deposit box, but everything had been taken out. Suddenly she thought Coral could have done this all. She had to go back. Coral and her mate Zak were dangerous. Coral had always found them back when they were without her. Coral and Zak had just followed them. And they hadn’t enough with just stealing everything. Gemma was in danger, in real danger. With her last money Esther went back. She went first to the bungalow where they were, but their wasn’t anybody. Then she went to the shrine, because Coral was always talking about it. There she found a burned body and on a finger was a ring, the ring which Steve had given to Gemma. It was Gemma. Gemma wasn’t dead. She runs away to get help, but she fell and somebody found her later. Then the story went five years further. Esther went on holiday with Steve to Thailand. They had a relationship then. Esther still had a bad life because of losing Gemma. The plane got engine problems and it must land in Delhi, India. Esther felt that it was now her time to search out what happened in the past, she had to talk to Coral. She left Steve and went on her own again the trip she made five years ago with Gemma. She was going to visit an ashram at an address on the Kulu road in order to find and to speak to someone about the dead of Gemma of which nobody believes she had been killed. Everybody thought it was an accident. Then she saw a house. After she had lifted the knocker, Zak opened the door. She asked: ‘Is she there?’ Zak said where she was. Then Gemma appeared. She was still alive. In the book was now a passage with the story of Gemma after Esther left. Here was told that the dead body wasn’t Gemma, but Coral. She wore the ring, because she wanted to marry with Zak. She died because she did a ritual with candels. And the candles fell. The ‘stolen’ stuff were not stolen, but Gemma had given Zak the key to get everything out of it. Gemma decided not to tell this all to Esther. Gemma told Esther that she wanted to stay here, because she would be happier here. Steve wasn’t the reason for this. If Steve wasn’t something which she could be mad on Esther, she would have said something else. Gemma married Zak and she was happy now. Esther discovered what she should have known all along. Gem and she loved each other once, but then it ended, like most childhood friendships eventually do. It did not matter who did what, it was not about guilt or blame. It was just about growing up.