Stitches In Time

Hoping to find out more about the mother she misses so much, Elise journeys all the way from Australia to Burgundy to visit her dead mother's sister. With her she carries much unwanted baggage: her grief for her mother, her phobia of being boxed in amongst crowds, her disturbing ability to glimpse flashes from the past.

In France, menacing and vivid glimpses of the past crowd in on Elise. Her aunt is prickly and evasive. The truth about her mother, when it comes, shatters Elise. While seeking solace in an ancient hospice where her mother used to sketch, her fear of crowds overwhelms her. She panics, then blacks out and wakes in a hospital bed.

Sisters in starched head-dresses and nun's habits unwind the bandages which bind her throbbing head. But surely nurses don't wear such outdated uniforms any more? And why can't she understand their French? After they bleed her with leeches, Elise begins to accept the impossible: she is stranded in a perilous, unpredictable past.

'Stitches In Time' is a gripping time-slip fantasy that transports us from present-day Australia to the hurly-burly of medieval Burgundy. Within this framework, Julie Ireland explores Elise's unresolved grief for her mother, her struggle with panic attacks and the family pattern of silence.