Andrea Gillies' brilliantly cogent investigations into the way Alzheimer's works are interwoven with her mother-in-law's unravelling grasp on reality.
Publisher: Octopus Publishing Group
ISBN: 9781906021993
Number of pages: 320
Dimensions: 198 x 126 mm
It's a fantastic book - down to earth and darkly comic in places. The judges found it compelling.
A wonderful book honest, upsetting, tender, sometimes angry, often funny which takes us on a journey into dementia and explores what it means to be human.
This is not another guide to be added to the depressing pile by the bedside for those who are confronting the decline of a relative. It is as much an exploration of memory, its loss and the subsequent erosion of personality, as a chronicle of the destructive chaos that the onset of Alzheimer's unleashes on the extended family... Somehow, despite the territory, Gillies manages to steer the book away from misery lit and beneath the profoundly bleak narrative runs a stream of grim humour. Most powerful, however, is Nancy's own voice, carefully recorded by Gillies in nightly diary entries, a voice that is at times cantankerous, bewildered and defiant. Reading these monologues, we get very close to understanding what it feels like to experience this illness... What makes this book so unexpected is the honesty with which Gillies records the catastrophic consequences of this well-intentioned act. - The Guardian
Terrific, terrifying, absolutely powerful in every choice of word, every sentence... completely unflinching
Whilst I found this informative and deeply moving, at times it was too horrifyingly graphic and uncomfortable reading for someone currently facing Dementia and it didn't have enough humour as suggested by... More
If you have any contact with dementia, perhaps a loved member of your family, this is the book to read.
Telling the tale of a family living through the nightmare, but at the same time explaining, in very readable...
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