Wendy Draws on Lancaster Years for her Novel
The novel is entitled 'Imperfect Strangers' under the pen name of Lea O'Harra.
As an English major at Indiana University, she jumped at the chance to spend her junior year in England in 1975, but found it a challenging as well as enjoyable experience. “It was the first time I had lived outside the States,” she said, “and I found the customs, the language, the ways of thinking in England quite different from those I was accustomed to in America.”
Wendy went on to do her MA at Lancaster and then got a PhD at Edinburgh University for her dissertation on letters revised and published by Alexander Pope, the 18th-century poet. She began working at a private Japanese university on the rural island of Shikoku upon completing her doctorate and has been employed full-time teaching English language and culture since her arrival in Japan in the spring of 1984.
“I have published widely on English and Japanese literature,” Wendy said, “but also I have begun writing so-called ‘creative non-fiction’ about my life in Japan as an American academic married to a Japanese farmer and the mother of three sons. My first crime novel, Imperfect Strangers, is a dissection of Japanese society as much as it is a murder mystery. Dating from my years in Lancaster and the culture shock I experienced as a callow young American then, I’ve always been fascinated by other countries.”
Imperfect Strangers is available on Amazon as an e-book and paperback. It has been reviewed by the author Suzanne Kamata who observes that “With her deep knowledge of Japanese culture, superb writing, and sensitivity to human foibles, [she] has crafted a cross-cultural whodunnit sure to please Japanophiles and mystery lovers alike.”