I didn't know this was a novel - I was expecting more of a biography, a continuation of the article I read about the author's warped family history - but Eleanor Anstruther weaves a compelling fictional tapestry of her father's life, both fascinating and fair to all involved. Writing about her father's childhood, and the court battle between his estranged mother and lesbian aunt, must have been a challenge for her, but also cathartic for her father and herself.

When Ian Anstruther was born in 1922, his mother Enid was already depressed, trapped in loveless marriage and racked with guilt over the fate of her eldest son Fagus, who was born with undiagnosed hydrocephalus and left blind after a fall down a fight of stairs. She tried to care for her children - Fagus, all but written out of the family by matriarch Sybil after his accident, daughter Finetta, and baby Ian - but resorted to a warped understanding of Christian Science to treat Fagus, her favourite, tying him to a chair and refusing to administer his medicine. Finally, two years later, Enid abandoned them all, moving to a Christian Science retreat in Norfolk.

Looking back, as the author does, Enid was clearly under considerable mental strain, with post natal depression after having a third child she didn't want and couldn't care for. Then, she was written off by her family, called 'unstable' and treated with anger and derision instead of sympathy and attention. Granddaughter Eleanor makes allowances for Enid's state of mind, and allows the reader to feel pity for her - but when Enid returns home, vindication of her behaviour becomes more and more difficult, until the author can only 'understand, without needing to say what she did was acceptable'. My allegiance swiftly shifted to the children after Enid and Joan began their battle over Ian, the heir to the family fortune. Neither his mother or his aunt cared about the little boy's happiness, they just seemed to want to control his inheritance. I don't care what level of society they came from, treating any child like a possession is always appalling. When Ian and Finetta finally visit Enid in a nursing home forty years later, I almost felt sorry for the old lady, abandoned by her children, but then remembered the poetic justice of her situation.

A truly stunning debut novel about a subject closer than usual to the author's heart. Recommended! ( )