A beautiful work that is in turn haunting touching and redemptive' SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIORE ?A
profoundly emotional book and a brave one' THE NEW YORKER 'Generous in spirit devoid of
self-pity and an authentic literary achievement' ANDREW SOLOMON ------ When Luiz Schwarcz was
a child he was told little about his grandfather Láios a Hungarian Jew. Only later would he
learn that Láios had ordered his son Luiz's father to leap from a train taking them to a Nazi
death camp while Láios himself was carried on to his death. What Luiz did know was that his
father's melancholia haunted the house he grew up in. As many children of trauma do Luiz
assumed responsibility for his parents' happiness and for a time blossomed into the family
prodigy. But then at a high point of outward success he was brought low by a devastating
mental breakdown. This astonishing memoir interrogates a personal story of mental health
through a family history of murder dispossession silence and the long echo of the Holocaust
across generations - animated by the love and compassion of a master storyteller. ----- 'Brave
honest devastating and hopeful ... Schwarcz is a masterful storyteller' ARIANA NEUMANN 'A
lyrical and intimate portrait of the author's lifelong harrowing battle with depression'
ABRAHAM VERGHESE
