This book is about the "ghost years, that time in your life you don't know won't never come again," as Mrs. Cunningham tells Roy and her son, Tommy. Barry Gifford has been writing the story of America in acclaimed novel after acclaimed novel for the last half-century. Almost all of Ghost Years takes place in the 1950s, and Giffort takes on a difficult time in his personal life as he examines the lives of women in that period-the suppression, the lack of opportunities, the dependency on men.

A tribute to the author's mother Kitty, the gritty Chicago landscape of his youth, and the "ghost years, that time in your life you don't knowwon't never come again."

Barry Gifford has been writing the story of America in acclaimed novel after acclaimed novel for the last half-century. Almost all of the stories in Ghost Years takes place in the 1950s, examining the lives of women in that period-the suppression, the lack of opportunities, the dependency on men.Following his story collection, Roy's World, which inspired the documentary directed by Rob Christopher, narrated by Lili Taylor, Matt Dillon and Willem Dafoe, these storiesshow a childhood in mid-century America filled with innocence, grief, joy and wonder in equal measure.