{"id":21713,"date":"2025-12-26T19:57:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-26T19:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/the-benefactors\/"},"modified":"2025-12-26T20:01:41","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T20:01:41","slug":"the-benefactors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/the-benefactors\/","title":{"rendered":"The Benefactors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Read: The Benefactors by Wendy Erskine \u2605\u2605\u2605\u2605 &#x1f4da;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>She has read that in Belfast during the conflict there were s\u00e9ances because so many were taken unexpectedly, leaving behind unanswered questions and husbands, wives, children who didn&#039;t get to hear or say a last I love you. Who couldn&#039;t understand why they wanted an ectoplasmic gush of revelation or reassurance? All bullshit of course, but a dark table in a house, a woman in a mantilla, Miriam would go there, if she knew of such a place.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>A girl is sexually assaulted by 3 of her &quot;friends&quot;. The novel explores the families involved, individual&#039;s histories, personalities &amp; class. Their stories are mixed in with other connected or disconnected fragments. No easy answers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Read: The Benefactors by Wendy Erskine \u2605\u2605\u2605\u2605 &#x1f4da; She has read that in Belfast during the conflict there were s\u00e9ances because so many were taken unexpectedly, leaving behind unanswered questions and husbands, wives, children who didn&#039;t get to hear or say a last I love you. Who couldn&#039;t understand why they wanted an ectoplasmic gush [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"status","meta":{"mf2_syndication":["https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/johnjohnston.info\/post\/3maw3cyuhzu2z","https:\/\/social.ds106.us\/@johnjohnston\/115787636470644851"],"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[898,953],"tags":[2021,1597],"post_format":[642],"class_list":{"0":"post-21713","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-status","6":"category-book","7":"category-posse","8":"tag-wendy-erskine","9":"tag-1597","10":"post_format-post-format-status","11":"kind-article","13":"h-entry","14":"hentry"},"better_featured_image":null,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p57zFQ-5Ed","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"kind":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21713"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21714,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21713\/revisions\/21714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21713"},{"taxonomy":"post_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnjohnston.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_format?post=21713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}