The Dead at Work

Just yesterday I noted that we would never see the final volume of William Manchester's biography of Winston S. Churchill. Apparently I was wrong.

Manchester's publisher now says it hopes to bring out the book in 2007. The chosen co-writer, a features reporter for the Palm Beach Post named Paul Reid, knew Manchester. He has already written 60 pages, picking up where Manchester left off, and has also carefully gone through the author's outline. Mr. Reid will do what Saul Karoo tried to do--take the confetti and turn it into a story.

The article touches on some other authors, such as Ludlum, who continue to publish from beyond the grave. Weird old V.C. Andrews gets a nod as well.

Death was a similar creative catalyst for V.C. Andrews, the writer of dark teenage thrillers who passed away in 1986 but has written ever since with the help of one Andrew Niederman. Mr. Niederman once said he believed he was channeling Andrews, a belief he seems to take literally--in fact, he even makes appearances at writers conferences as V.C. Andrews.

However, the lure of continued income from a dead author does not appeal to all. Plans to publish fragments of the Aubrey/Mathurin novel that Patrick O'Brian was working on at the time of his death, have met with opposition from his family.

Nikolai Tolstoy, O'Brian's stepson and father of four of the beneficiaries, said the book was at a "crude" stage and to publish it would be a "travesty" which the reclusive and perfectionist author would have loathed.

"It is crude and unfinished. He would have been dismayed and horrified."