My Friend Richard : A True Ghost Story is a well-written, short memoir. It includes, but is not limited to, William Hart's relationship with the spirit of Richard, his best friend from high school.
Richard died when he was 25 because he ran back into a burning building to try to save his guitar. This action is an indication of how wild and hyperfocused he could be and it's not the only irrational impulse Richard acted on during his short life. Those actions give us a picture of someone impossible to forget but also someone whose spirit would be determined enough to reach out to the friend he left behind.
My favorite chapter in Hart's book is the last one. In the previous chapters he told us of Richard's attempts to communicate and the effect this ghost had on his life. In the last chapter he discusses the reality of spirits among us. Here is an excerpt from this section:
“Western science, focused entirely on the material, denies or ignores the existence of a spiritual reality in the universe, making our physics terribly incomplete.”
