The enthralling new novel from the highly acclaimed author of How To Be A Good Wife
"Evocative, harrowing ... Emma Chapman tackles the big subjects of love and war with aplomb" Tatler
He walks into the living room and June is dead.
He centres her, checking the light. Focusing, he clicks the shutter.
He'll ask himself later, if he knew. It's easy to say that he had acted without thinking, out of instinct.
Rook Henderson is an award-winning photojournalist, still carrying the hidden scars of war. Now, suddenly, he is also a widower. Leaving his son Ralph to pick up the pieces, Rook packs his belongings and flies to Vietnam for the first time in fifty years.
As Rook reconnects with the changed landscape of a place he once knew so well, he reflects upon a life defined through his work in wartime Vietnam, and then further back in time through rural life in the 1970s, fashionable London in the 1960s, a post-war working class childhood in a Yorkshire mining town, and a secret grief he's never been able to forget.
When Ralph follows him to Vietnam, seeking answers from the father he barely knows, Rook is forced to reconsider his marriage to the unforgettable June and the price he has paid for a life behind the lens. Emma Chapman was born in 1985 and grew up in Manchester. She studied English Literature at Edinburgh University, followed by an MA in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway, and now lives in North Yorkshire. Her highly acclaimed debut novel, How To Be A Good Wife, was longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. While researching The Last Photograph in Vietnam, Emma set up a charity called Vietnam Volunteer Teachers (www.vietnamvolunteerteachers.com) to bring native English speakers to remote areas of the country.
