The Lost Child - Softcover

Myerson, Julie

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1408800772 ISBN 13: 9781408800775

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, 2009

Synopsis

'Urgent and vivid A serious, writerly, self-critical account of what it means to feel that, despite love and hope and good intentions, you have failed as a parent, and that the child you bore (while still eerily, painfully familiar) is lost to you. Which is not the same thing as saying that it is the complete truth. Art can only ever hope to present a version of the truth. And this is what Julie Myerson has done' Daily Telegraph 'An aching, empty-nest memoir: a mother mourning for her uncomplicated little children, now grown, whom she could care for, write about without comeback, love - and control'The Times Myerson's motivation is anything but base. She could have disguised her material in a novel, but she wanted to make sense of reality, to understand the chaos that has taken over her family. She wanted to help others, herself and her son Any family for whom cannabis has been a wrecker, even if they would not dream of exposing their situation in the same way Myerson has, will be grateful to her for having done so. She may have been rash, but she has also been courageous. She has tried to write honestly about a nightmarish situation and a subject that never seems to get the attention it deserves' Observer 'Yelloly, however ephemeral, fulfils a function - she is a lost girl, one who cannot be revived, from a family ravaged by that Victorian scourge, consumption. And Myerson's real, parallel lament is for a child who falls victim to our modern version of consumption - the slow ruination of a much-loved child through drugs gripping' Financial Times 'A campaigning book If the question is whether a woman has a right to tell a story that is also, actually, her own - a book reviewer can only say yes. And add that anyone who reads it will struggle not to be profoundly moved' Independent

About this title

Review:

'Honest, affecting and noble' Mark Lawson, Guardian 'Julie spells out her pain in prose that's so pure, so literal and so terribly engrossing it makes you weep. And she doesn't flinch from revealing everything - including her own insecurities and inadequacies as a mother ... by the end of this excruciatingly sad book, it is very clear that she didn't do this for art, but for love' Daily Mirror 'Devastating in its candour' Daily Telegraph 'It is impossible not to empathise' The Times

Book Description:

`Her writing is never less than compelling with its lopped lyricism, like someone who has to keep catching their breath ... The book not only has three strands, it has three audiences: Myerson, her son and anyone who has suffered anything comparable'

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1408800772
• ISBN 13: 9781408800775
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 336