Author hopes to reunite soon with husband
A WELSH novelist who returned home to launch her book has been separated from her husband in California because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Liz Unser, 76, from Cardiff, and her husband Larry, 74, spend half the year at their home in Roath and the rest at their second home north of San Francisco.
Liz and Larry have been hopping back and forth across the Atlantic for the past 16 years, normally travelling together, but with the launch of her debut novel, Winter Into Spring, Liz returned home early – arriving the day before the UK Government announced lockdown.
The couple have now spent the past two months apart and are uncertain when they will be able to reunite.
“The book was going to be launched in March back here so I wanted to come back a couple of weeks early,” said Liz.
“I flew back on the last day before lockdown. My husband was going to come back on April 14 but all air flight was cancelled.
“There was a lot of discussions about even if there were flights would it be sensible or safe to fly.
“Usually you’re cocooned with a couple of hundred other people on the plane and passing people in the airport.
“I have a medical background so when I flew, even though it was before the official lockdown I wore a mask and was incredibly careful, and when I came home I went into a 14-day self-imposed quarantine because it made sense and I can’t believe people haven’t already been asked to do that.”
While the couple are separated by continents, they’re doing their best to stay in touch and talk every day.
Liz said: “Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, it’s been quite doable. We WhatsApp and video chat every day, which can be frustrating because we’re not doing much at the moment.
“It was very hot last week in California and he’s just started playing golf again because the golf courses have reopened and he got rained on. I was saying there’s beautiful sunshine here. He’s a Californian man so he doesn’t like the cold weather, so that’s one of the reasons we go to California in winter – but he loves Cardiff and has lots of friends here.
“We’re both on our second marriage and have eight grandchildren between us, four on either side of the Atlantic.”
While air travel remains uncertain, tentative steps have been made for when the aviation industry can restart, so Liz and Larry hope to be reunited as soon as possible.
Camarthen-born Liz said: “We’ve talked a lot about when it would be sensible and it turns out the first flights are starting up beginning of July so he’ll come back to Wales then and will go into quarantine for two weeks when he gets back.”
Liz took up writing after retiring as a social worker. Her book, Winter Into Spring, is now available in physical and digital formats.
The romantic fiction novel contains elements of the author’s Buddhist religion, but Liz was keen to not “ram home” the message.
She said: “One day I picked up what I thought was light romantic fiction in the library and when I got home and looked at it I nearly threw it across the room. It was Christian romantic fiction, with a verse from the Bible at the end of every chapter.
“By the time I read it I knew what I wanted to write. I would write a Buddhist version – but a book that would stand on its own merits and not ram home any messages.
“If people didn’t want the message, it would still be a good read.”