Darryl Kennedy’s book, The Wednesday Arrangement, is told as a retrospective and traces the courtship, then marriage, of a wealthy ex-drunk and Rhodes Scholar, Michael Delauny, to Amanda Smythe, a strongly religious actress, and the defenses they both erect against their orphaned pasts. 

They first met in Israel, pursued there for their 'crimes.' Amanda, a beautiful and stunningly vibrant actress, yet hiding old prejudices behind her Roman faith, and Michael, the wealthy scholar, marksman, and disreputable drunk, who had gone to the Dead Sea as the lowest place on earth to get sober. Both had only a toe-hold on life, but kept running to prevent themselves from falling. 

They courted there, and then married in Italy, traveling through much of Europe before returning home, while keeping their secrets intact. Why tell your husband of your troubled past? Would he even listen, if then to be forced to tell of his own family madness? But secrecy exacts a cost. 

So a Wednesday arrangement begins: three days, Wednesday to Friday, apart in the city, to locations not known to one another. Amanda is to care for her demented step-mother while Michael hides out in a city flop-house, in denial of his wealth. 

 

About the Author

Darryl Kennedy is a New Zealander with a Master's in English, and special interest in early twentieth century English literature. After three years teaching at university entrance level, he set up in partnership The Everyman Book and Record Shop in Nelson, New Zealand; still a city landmark store after thirty years. Moving to Australia to live, he traveled to Europe three times, working on plantations in Israel – the Galilee and West Bank – before returning to work the liquor industry for fourteen years on Queensland Gold Coast. He has published one poem, and has a special interest in Confessional poetry and Literary Criticism. This manuscript, over six years in the making, examines T.S. Eliot's notion that the ancient Greek Furies, who are supposed to become benign in the end, visit upon us all.