Elizabeth Is Missing
Emma Healey, 2014
HarperCollins
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062309686
Summary
Winner, 2014 Costa First Novel Award
In this darkly riveting debut novel—a sophisticated psychological mystery that is also an heartbreakingly honest meditation on memory, identity, and aging—an elderly woman descending into dementia embarks on a desperate quest to find the best friend she believes has disappeared, and her search for the truth will go back decades and have shattering consequences.
Maud, an aging grandmother, is slowly losing her memory—and her grip on everyday life. Yet she refuses to forget her best friend Elizabeth, whom she is convinced is missing and in terrible danger.
But no one will listen to Maud—not her frustrated daughter, Helen, not her caretakers, not the police, and especially not Elizabeth’s mercurial son, Peter. Armed with handwritten notes she leaves for herself and an overwhelming feeling that Elizabeth needs her help, Maud resolves to discover the truth and save her beloved friend.
This singular obsession forms a cornerstone of Maud’s rapidly dissolving present. But the clues she discovers seem only to lead her deeper into her past, to another unsolved disappearance: her sister, Sukey, who vanished shortly after World War II.
As vivid memories of a tragedy that occurred more fifty years ago come flooding back, Maud discovers new momentum in her search for her friend. Could the mystery of Sukey’s disappearance hold the key to finding Elizabeth? (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—February 27, 1985
• Where—London, England, UK
• Education—M.A., University of East Anglia
• Awards—Costa Award, First Novel; Betty Trask Award
• Currently—lives in Norwich, England
Emma Healey holds a degree in bookbinding and an MA in creative writing. Elizabeth Is Missing is her first novel. She lives in the United Kingdom. (From the publishers.)
Book Reviews
Maud Horsham, the narrator of Emma Healey’s spellbinding first novel…is aware that she’s slipping into dementia.… It’s a sad and lonely business watching your identity slowly slip away. But even at the end, Maud insists on making herself heard and understood.
New York Times Book Review
[A] knockout debut…. Ms. Healey’s audacious conception and formidable talent combine in a bravura performance that sustains its momentum and pathos to the last.
Wall Street Journal
Elizabeth Is Missing is every bit as compelling as the… hype suggests.… The novel is both a gripping detective yarn and a haunting depiction of mental illness, but also more poignant and blackly comic than you might expect.
Observer (UK)
This is no conventional crime novel but a compelling work that crosses literary genres.… The result is bold, touching and hugely memorable.
Sunday Times (UK)
It is a gripping thriller, but it’s also about life and love: the love of an exasperated daughter for her mother; the love of sisters and of friends and the love I felt for Maud.
Independent (UK)
A compelling read, Elizabeth is Missing offers added depth of mystery and suspense along with aptly portraying a family trying to cope with illness.
New York Journal of Books
British author Healey draws on her own grandmothers’ experiences…. Few readers may want to journey through the mind of a person with dementia, but Healey demonstrates that an absorbing tale can indeed be written from such a perspective.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Delving into the mind of a woman suffering from dementia, Healey uses her unreliable narrator to create realistic tension. Suspenseful and emotional in equal parts, the author's debut hits all the right notes. —Jane Jorgenson, Madison P.L., WI
Library Journal
(Starred review.) Part mystery, part meditation on memory, part Dickensian revelation of how apparent charity may hurt its recipients, this is altogether brilliant
Booklist
Maud's memory is failing, slipping further away each day. So how can she convince anyone that her best friend is truly missing?… A poignant novel of loss.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What interesting and complex narrative effects result from the narrator having such difficulty with her memory?
2. Consider the prominent image of summer squash in the novel. What connotations does it add to the story? What are the various effects of the repeated references?
3. What key details are introduced in the Prologue?
4. How does the consistent shift from present to past affect the telling of the story? How does the author transition between them?
5. In Chapter 1 there are several allusions to Little Red Riding Hood. In what ways might this fairy tale be relevant to the story?
6. Carla, one of Maud's caregivers, often tells of horrible crimes she's read about in the news. What does this add to the novel? How does it affect Maud?
7. What is the difference between something or someone being missing, lost, or gone? Consider various points of view.
8. In what relevant ways does the war--and all the lengthy separations it causes — affect the people and relationships in the novel?
9. What is the importance and effect of "the mad woman" throughout the novel?
10. Consider Douglas and Frank. Both seemingly have moments of menace and kindness. In what ways are they similar or different?
11. In Chapter 10, Maud, having forgotten what room she was headed to, says, "I must be going mad." In what ways is she similar to or different from the mad woman?
12. What does the subject of Maud's childhood illness add to the story?
13. Throughout her life, but especially once her sister Sukey goes missing, Maud collects random, found objects. In what various ways do physical objects come to possess meaning or value?
14. Of what particular significance to the novel is the detail of Maud collecting "boxes full of disintegrating bees and wasps and beetles"?
15. At one point, speaking to Frank, Maud denies that she has secrets, but then admits to liking the idea. In what ways might secrets be important? How can they be unhealthy?
16. Late in the novel, Maud touches something of her sister's and says, "The contact makes it possible to breathe again." What is she experiencing?
17. What does Maud's granddaughter Katy bring to the novel?
18. Consider the Epilogue. What is the effect of ending the novel with the lyric swirl of Maud's receding memories?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)