Inspired by the story of the author’s grandparents’ marriage, this elegant, heartbreaking novel shows the effects of mental illness on a family.
Boston 1963 and Frederick Merrill is
incarcerated in the US’s most prestigious mental hospital, The Mayflower Home for the Mentally Ill. As he copes with fellow inmates’ suicides and his own fractured sense of the world, Frederick’s wife Katharine faces up to the volatile reality of her marriage. Wed after a whirlwind courtship, she expected a happy-
ever-after ending. Four children later, and a catalogue of affairs, manic passions, violent mood swings and failed business ventures, she has him sectioned at the behest of family and friends. It’s a tough, beautifully nuanced story of marriage and mania.
Reviewed by Eithne Farry
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By Eithne Farry - Monday 18 July 2011
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