Rayna could not remember making the decision
to become an actor, actress then, but then again,
perhaps she’d never decided much at all. Life had
a way of just unfolding.
From a gifted new storyteller comes a poignant and
darkly comic meditation on love, loss, and the relentless
pursuit of artistic expression.
Dame Rayna Velo, a double Oscar-winner and an unexpected
British icon, finds herself recently widowed and teetering
on the brink of financial and professional ruin. Alone
in the depths of a decaying Victorian theatre, she
faces a performance that she realizes will signal
the end of everything she has known.
Spanning seventy years, A Fine Husband takes
us on a journey through Rayna's tumultuous life and
the intertwined fates of two extraordinary husbands—each,
in their own maddening way, striving to prevent her
from fading quietly into oblivion.
Wickedly sharp and richly humane, A Fine Husband
is a luminous debut, alive with unforgettable characters,
the specters of the stage, and the fierce absurdity
of a life spent in the pursuit of meaning.
Originally published in the 2022 issues of The
First Line and The Last Line, A Fine
Husband is broken into five acts and includes
11 new short stories. The lines that inspired Diggory
were:
Vol. 24, Iss. 1: Rayna sat in front of the mirror
removing her makeup and wondered who she would discover
underneath.
Vol. 24, Iss. 2: Thomas hadn't expected to be alive
when the town's time capsule was opened.
Vol. 24, Iss. 3: Lily unlocked the back door of
the thrift store using a key that didn't belong
to her.
Vol. 24, Iss. 4: When he died, their father had
two requests.
Issue 8: The shredder roared to life, grinding
the letter into tiny pieces of confetti.
About the author: Diggory Dunn
was born in South London. He received a BA and an
MA in English Literature from the University of York
before training to be a teacher. He has lived in Barcelona,
Spain, for the last ten years and is an assistant
fiction editor of The Barcelona Review. A
Fine Husband is his first novel..
