Cass Reisender doesn’t enjoy her psychic abilities. They appeared after her parents were killed in a tragic accident and led her to Madame Freyja, a travelling fortune teller and all-round terrible person. Swearing to leave both her psychic sensitivity and Madame Freyja behind, Cass starts again in Calgary, Alberta, a city with nothing supernatural about it at all. Then Cass touches a strange antique device and her new life is blown apart.

Transported to West Orange, New Jersey, in the year 1900, Cass meets the dashing Erik Thorvaldsen in Thomas Edison’s – that Thomas Edison’s – laboratory. As she and Erik grow closer, Cass finally accepts herself as she finds love in a life lived across centuries. Yet Madame Freyja lurks in the shadows, hungry for the power of the time travel device. When Madame Freyja strikes, Cass must face both her fears and her past or lose her connection to Erik forever.

Flicker is a playful, fast-paced romp through the golden age of invention, mythology, and the supernatural. This is a novel for everyone who believes in the power of scientific curiosity and the strength of the human heart.

Descended from a long line of music lovers, Lori Hahnel is the author of three previous fiction collections including Nothing Sacred (Thistledown, 2009), which was shortlisted for the Alberta Literary Award for fiction. Her writing has been published across North America and in the U.K.; her credits include CBC Radio, The Fiddlehead, Prairie Fire, and Room. Relevant to the novel After You’ve Gone is the fact that during the early days of Calgary's punk scene, Hahnel was a founding member of The Virgins, a power-pop punk group that carved its place in Calgary rock history as the city's first all-female band. Today Lori teaches creative writing at Mount Royal University and The Alexandra Writers’ Centre Society, where she served as writer-in-residence in 2013. She has also been writer-in-residence for Alberta branch of the Canadian Authors Association, and is a co-founder and participant in Calgary’s Writing in the Works reading series. She lives in Calgary with her husband and sons.

Lori Hahnel's profile page

A page-turner, a delightfully compelling read . . . Highly Reccomended.

Ottawa Review of Books