Mayhem: A Memoir - Softcover

Rausing, Sigrid

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0241977061 ISBN 13: 9780241977064

Publisher: Penguin, 2018

Synopsis

A Sunday Times Book of the Year

'Riveting, clear-sighted and exceptionally articulate... Her literary and psychoanalytic fluency gives the book an impact that feels arrestingly honest... Heartbreaking' Daily Telegraph

'An unsparing account of a family destroyed by drugs. Unique and haunting' Sunday Times

'What gives this book its astonishing power is not the guilt, but the intelligence and literary skill' Guardian

'I write, knowing that writing at all may be seen as a betrayal of family; a shaming, exploitative act. Anyone reading this who thinks so, please know that I thought it before you'

For years Sigrid Rausing watched helplessly as her brother Hans and his wife Eva succumbed to drug addiction. It afflicted a terrible toll on their family, culminating in Eva's tragic early death. As this death led to inquest and media circus, the world looked on in horror, but few understood the suffering endured by the Rausing family.

In Mayhem, Sigrid explores the collateral damage addiction wreaks on loved ones. Telling her family's story, she examines painful and rarely discussed questions. What is it like to live with addiction in the family? How can you help without hurting the one you love? And what does it mean to survive another's addiction?

About this title

Review

Fierce, lyrical, and lucid memoir

(Siri Hustvedt)

A profoundly articulate and harrowing memoir of a family grappling with addiction... I was impressed and moved (A. M. Homes)

A short, intense and moving memoir... a poignant and at times harrowing account that testifies to the resilience of the human spirit (Tatler)

Powerful and spare... her elisions and prevarications have a striking effect (The Observer)

Such a unique and haunting story to tell (The Sunday Times)

What gives this book its astonishing power is not the guilt, but the intelligence and literary skill. Beautifully structured... Rausing sets the scene with painterly delicacy and then steps back to analyse the implications of what she has revealed (The Guardian)

A deeply felt memorial to a lost brother...a finely written memoir (Literary Review)

Riveting, clear-sighted and exceptionally articulate...heartbreaking...her literary and psychoanalytic fluency gives the book an impact that feels arrestingly honest (Daily Telegraph)

Touched by its bravery, sincerity and the frequent beauty of the writing (The Times)

In this slim, stoic memoir... Rausing thoughtfully, painstakingly, works a deep groove into the stubborn surface of certain bedevilling questions: "How do you write about addiction?"... I nodded and sometimes cried. I wanted to invite the author over for tea (The Millions)

From the Back Cover

"Mesmerizing. Rausing explores sweeping questions about what it means to choose or refuse a moral life, what tragedy looks like when it is woven into privilege, and how we control or surrender to our perceived destinies. Written in elegiac, lyrical prose, Mayhem is deeply passionate in its impossible attempt to adduce a redeeming vitality from an agonizing chaos. A brave, elegant, and inspired book." Andrew Solomon

'Mayhem is astonishing. All the tides of trouble run through it: ferocity and gentleness, doubt and certainty, love and fear, knowledge and confusion and, above all, a deep and ineradicable longing for things to be good or good again. Unlike many books that dwell on pain, Sigrid Rausing's intelligence is never absent, so that heart and mind remain vividly and often shockingly alive in every corner and fragment. Its dignity, power and beauty burn off the page.' Adam Nicolson

"This is a fierce, lyrical, and lucid memoir that asks agonizing questions about guilt, innocence, and judgment and reminds us how difficult it can be to untangle one from the other." Siri Hustvedt

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 2018
• ISBN 10: 0241977061
• ISBN 13: 9780241977064
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224