Love Stories for Ghosts

by Alex Latimer

172 pages, Paperback

Published March 2, 2024

About the author

Alex Latimer lives near the border of a national park so when not writing or drawing, he spends his free time shooing baboons out of his lounge. The Boy Who Cried Ninja is his first book for children. He lives in South Africa.

Reviews

[Gerhard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review to follow.

[Helené Coetzee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful writing with delicious stories I read bite for bite over a few weeks. I felt them linger and will be returning to this book again.

[Jané · Rating 5 out of 5]

"There's a saying we have here: heaven for dogs is hell for cats. Which means that one place can be two things at the same time, depending on how you look at it."

[Riley Herbert-Henry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alex Latimer's debut collection of short stories, Love Stories for Ghosts, is a beautiful exploration of love, life and death and how they are all interconnected and are not mutually exclusive from one another.

With stories ranging from collecting your body parts piece-by-piece in the afterlife to reincarnating as a foul odour, Latimer takes the topic of death and distills it down into enjoyable and, often, funny stories about alternate realities in the after life. He also tells stories of the people who are left behind and the way that they deal with grief.

An original and vivid collection from an exceptionally unique voice. Highly recommend!

[Dawn Munro · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a collection of 9 short stories written over a span of 8 years. You could devour this book in 8 hours, which I nearly did, but managed to stop myself after 3 stories. I am now rationing myself to 1 story per month! Even though I have not finished, I really wanted to post a review of what I have read so far. I won’t post spoilers. I live with Grief for the loss of my Mum and Dad, so the content is familiar and I had some good “ah ha” moments. Quirky and ethereal, poignant and cynical, clever and silly, gentle and brutal and insightful. The local references spoke to my roots, and I found myself smiling, laughing out loud and wiping away tears with a lump in my throat. I can honestly say that the 5 stories I have read so far have left me totally satisfied and wanting more. I hope Alex writes more adult stories!

[Ciaran R. Maidwell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found all of these stories so incredibly beautiful. I had to pause between each one and give them room in my head because there was always a lot to think about afterwards. The prose is so spare and unpretentious, considering the subject matter. Just a really good experience and I wish it was longer!