A powerful and moving exploration of the terrible illness that touches millions of lives

After her own father’s death from dementia, the writer and campaigner Nicci Gerrard set out to explore the illness that now touches millions of us, yet which we still struggle to speak about. What is it to be oneself, and what is it to lose one’s self. Who are we when we are not ourselves, and where do we go?

This is book is an attempt to understand thorough a touching exploration of dementia, structured around the stages of the disease from the outside and, as far as possible, from the inside as well. Full of people’s stories, both sad and optimistic, it is a journey into the dusk and then the darkness - and then out on to the other side, where, once someone is dead, a life can be seen whole again.