In the last chapter of The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (left) observes: ‘I realize as I write this that I do not want to finish this account’. Blue Nights is a kind of continuation of this memoir – and while the first addressed the death of her husband, this second memoir is about the death of their daughter Quintana and her own increasing frailty as she approached her eighties.

While The Year of Magical Thinking was completed within a year of her husband’s death, Blue Notes was written five years after the death of Quintana. This greater distance from the event provides a different perspective on the effects of grief, but both memoirs explore Western attitudes towards death and bereavement and the complexity of what Didion calls the ‘question of self-pity’.

Quintana was still alive when The Year of Magical Thinking was finished, but had died by the time it was published. A play was adapted from the memoir; Didion comments in Blue Nights that she loves seeing it performed, as Quintana remains alive for the duration of the play. Blue Nights is filled with fragments of memories of Quintana, often triggered by old photographs and scraps of writing from her childhood.

The style here is a little more unconventional than The Year of Magical Thinking. Constantly repeated words and phrases disrupt the narrative and Didion directly addresses the reader, urging us to ‘please note’ or ‘think that over’. Blue Nights is at its best when observing our inability to grasp the passage of time and comprehend the process of aging. The acknowledgment of her own increasing fragility is beautifully conveyed in her distinctive measured, yet restless, style of prose.

Kara Nicholson is from Readings Carlton.