AustLit

'It is the late 1990s. Christian, charismatic and idealistic friend of the poor and oppressed around the world, lies in a coma, following an operation to cure the condition which is causing his fingers to curl up into a claw.

His wife, Claire, begins to have strange dreams, which she believes are subliminal messages from her husband?s still-active brain, and which lead her to embark on a voyage of discovery about him. Prompted by these messages, she travels, first, to Italy and then to India, where she discovers a secretive and depressive side to her husband?s character, and evidence of activities that lead her to question her belief in his essential goodness. As events unfold, she gains a deeper understanding of her husband?s nature and of their relationship.

Dupuytren's Contracture is an unfolding mystery which raises important questions about moral, political and personal values in the globalising world of the late twentieth century. Its central theme is giving versus grasping, generosity versus greed, symbolised by the fingers of the hand, straight and healthy or bent and diseased.' (Publisher's blurb)