Diary

Diary takes the form of a ‘coma diary’ kept by one Misty Wilmot as her husband lies senseless in hospital after a suicide attempt.

Once she was an art student dreaming of creativity and freedom; now, after marrying Peter at art school and being brought back to once quaint, now tourist-overrun Waytansea Island, she’s been reduced to the condition of a resort hotel maid. Peter, it turns out, has been hiding rooms in houses he’s refurbished and scrawling vile messages all over the walls – an old habit of builders but gone nuts on his part. Angry homeowners are suing left and right, and Misty’s dreams of artistic greatness are in ashes: But then, as it possessed by the spirit of Maura Kinkaid, a fabled Waytansea artist of the nineteenth century, Misty begins painting again, compulsively.

The canvases are taken away by her mother-in-law and her doctor, who seem to have a plan for Misty – and for all those annoying tourists…