Stranger With My Face

STRANGER WITH MY FACE isn't a mystery in the classic sense; as soon as Laurie's friend, Helen, is discovered battered and abandoned, the reader knows Laurie's double is responsible. The real mystery of the story, though, is which path Laurie will choose: Will she explore her psychic powers and her past, or will she embrace the present and defend her family?

As intriguing as this question becomes, and as menacing a figure as Lia is, these elements of the novel are almost secondary to the exploration of astral projection that's at the heart of the story. Duncan makes out-of-body travel seem so commonplace that even the most literal-minded readers might lose some of their skepticism. In fact, most readers will be so absorbed by these supernatural elements that they'll overlook many of the book's inconsistencies. Laurie tells us this story at age 17, only a year after the events described, but her voice often sounds more middle-age than teenage -- she repeatedly refers to her younger siblings as "the children," for example.