A decade ended, along with a century and the millennium. Novels were written, published, reviewed. A son crossed the wide Pacific to take up an engineering position in British Columbia; a husband rose higher up the corporate ladder, relishing frequent business trips to Europe and Asia.
Cocooned within an air-conditioned space, Anna remained indifferent to a world of terrorist attacks, global financial crisis, increasing numbers of refugees and the dire predictions of climate scientists. Technology aided her withdrawal from reality. Her website and blog were available to readers 24/7 and f*******: friends were easy to contact on a daily or weekly basis. Brief text messages took the place of lengthy phone conversations, while the advent of FaceTime enabled her to not only see the magnificen
