'When I see her, my first emotion is anger, not sorrow, or the fear I raced here with - that I would be too late' When Carol Lee's cherished god-daughter Emma descended into a long and frightening battle with Anorexia, Carol found herself at a loss to know quite what to do. Faced with a confusing assortment of perspectives, theories and treatments from the medical and psychiatric professions, there seemed to be little agreement regarding this perplexing, voracious and sometimes fatal illness. This is the true story of Carol's relationship with Emma , the girl who 'adopted me in a London pub when she was two and three quarters'. Carol tells of her quest to understand and help Emma , weaving back and forth in time creating a picture of Emma's childhood and describing her long battle with anorexia; her time spent in a secure unit, the secrecy and fury that forever lurked beneath the fragile surface and the infuriating, heartbreaking but ultimately life-saving relationship that they share. Now, fully recovered, we learn through the entries of her diaries and in the book's afterword how Emma struggled to escape from her dangerous, extraordinary 'dark romance' with anorexia and how it was the stories and words that were fed to her that helped her to slowly become well again.
"A disturbing and important book written with tough compassion from both outside and inside the self-destructive world of anorexic..." Maureen Duffy
"beautifully written...vividly evoke[s] the ferociousness of their struggle" Scottish Daily Record
"Fascinating book" Bella
"Sharply written account. Refreshingly upfront" Ham & High
Author
About Carol Lee
Carol Lee is an author, journalist and Alexander Technique teacher. She is a visiting lecturer in journalism at the Department of Postgraduate Studies, City University , London. She has written for The Observer, Independent, Guardian, Sunday Times and many national magazines. Her play, Feet First, was staged at the King's Head, Islington, London. To Die For is her seventh book.
'When I see her, my first emotion is anger, not sorrow, or the fear I raced here with - that I would be too late' When Carol Lee's cherished god-daughter Emma descended into a long and frightening battle with Anorexia, Carol found herself at a loss to know quite what to do. Faced with a confusing assortment of perspectives, theories and treatments from the medical and psychiatric professions, there seemed to be little agreement regarding this perplexing, voracious and sometimes fatal illness. This is the true story of Carol's relationship with Emma , the girl who 'adopted me in a London pub when she was two and three quarters'. Carol tells of her quest to understand and help Emma , weaving back and forth in time creating a picture of Emma's childhood and describing her long battle with anorexia; her time spent in a secure unit, the secrecy and fury that forever lurked beneath the fragile surface and the infuriating, heartbreaking but ultimately life-saving relationship that they share. Now, fully recovered, we learn through the entries of her diaries and in the book's afterword how Emma struggled to escape from her dangerous, extraordinary 'dark romance' with anorexia and how it was the stories and words that were fed to her that helped her to slowly become well again.
To Die For features in the following genres: Biographies & Autobiographies, Biography, Literature and Literary studies
To Die For is available in Paperback
To Die For was written by Carol Lee and published by Arrow
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