Twins. Cemeteries. Ghosts. Lovely and engaging writing. If any of these things sound interesting, you should pick up Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife. It's being published on Tuesday.

Elspeth Noblin, aged 44, dies of cancer in London, leaving her downstairs neighbor and lover, Robert, bereft. Elspeth had an identical twin sister, Edie, whom she had not seen since shortly after Edie ran off to America with Elspeth's fiance, Jack Poole.

Edie and Jack themselves have a set of twin daughters, Julia and Valentina. Elspeth leaves her apartment to them in her will, with the stipulations that the girls live there for a year and that Jack and Edie never set foot in it. The twins, as they are often called — they are identical mirror twins and exceptionally close — accept. They are smart but without direction, have already dropped out of college twice, so it seems like a fine idea to leave their native Chicago to move to London for a year.

When they arrive, they do not immediately meet their neighbors in the other two apartments. Martin, who lives upstairs, is a brilliant man with a grown son and a wife who is exasperated with his unchecked obsessive-compulsive disorder. Having added agoraphobia to his list, he naturally does not venture out to greet the girls. Robert lives on the first floor and is both a shy person and daunted at finally meeting Elspeth's nieces. It is weeks before he speaks to them, and then only when they attend his tour at Highgate, a Victorian cemetery next door to their apartment building, where he is a guide.

Secrets abound among this group. Elspeth never told Robert about her parting from Edie. Edie doesn't confide in Jack. The twins know something happened but can't get anyone to tell them about it.

There is also something strange about Elspeth's flat. There are weird temperature variations, and objects appear to move around by themselves when no one is watching. Could it be Elspeth is not entirely out of the picture?

The supernatural aside, love and identity are a main themes of this story. Julia is the dominant twin, but Victoria resents Julia's bossing. How can Victoria become her own self when Julia won't let her go? Julia, for her part, feels she must protect and care for Victoria, who suffers from asthma and is sickly.

At the same time, each girl feels incomplete without the other, and love is also like that for Robert and Martin, who in their own ways are forced to explore what it is like to be alone.

Article Author: Nancy Fontaine

Nancy Fontaine is a librarian and freelance writer living in New Hampshire with her husband, two cats, and every four years during presidential primary season, the national press.

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