Irish author’s mental health memoir shortlisted for prize
An Irish author has been shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize, an annual British award celebrating the best new books that illuminate how health, medicine and illness touches our lives.
The six shortlisted authors are from the UK, Ireland, USA, Australia and India.
The Irish entry is Mind On Fire: A Memoir Of Madness And Recovery. Written by Arnold Thomas Fanning, this searing memoir is a harrowing insight into the consciousness of someone living with mania, psychosis and severe depression.
Fanning had his first experience of depression during adolescence, following the death of his mother. In his 20s, he was overcome by mania and delusions, was often suicidal, increasingly disconnected from family and friends, and sometimes in trouble with the law.
Drawing on his own memories, the recollections of people who knew him when he was at his worst, and medical records, Fanning has produced a beautifully written, devastatingly intense account of madness — and recovery, to the point where he has not had any serious illness for over a decade. Mind on Fire is the gripping, sometimes harrowing and ultimately uplifting testament of a person who has visited hellish regions of the mind and survived.
Chosen by award-winning author Elif Shafak and her fellow judges, the six titles on the shortlist range from memoir to comic novel in an exploration of gender, identity and mental health.
Mind On Fire is also one of two titles on the shortlist that explores mental health and mortality. The other is Heart: A History, written by Indian-American cardiologist Sandeep Jauhar which draws on both his professional expertise and his personal medical history to give an insight into how organ works and the importance of facing our own mortality.
