WINNER of the Chairman's Choice Award at the British Medical Association Book Awards 2013
HIGHLY COMMENDED in the Popular Medicine category at the British Medical Association Book Awards 2013
"Deeply loving yet wryly comic... The most moving portrait of this cruel disease you'll ever read" - The Daily Mail
THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE RADIATOR is an award-winning book. A tale of love, loss and family: the touching, sometimes hilarious and occasionally heartbreaking story of a man’s struggle to care for his mother after her diagnosis with Alzheimer’s disease.
Martin Slevin’s mum was a highly active, very intelligent and fiercely independent woman who ran her own business and ruled Martin and his father with a rod of iron. But after Martin’s dad dies, her life crumbles, and she becomes listless and forgetful. Eventually, she is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, and Martin puts his own life on hold to care for her. Together, they embark on a journey through the various stages of the condition; the destination is never in doubt, but along the way there are many lighter moments, as she shaves the dog’s bottom, holds sing-songs with an imaginary Irish band and pins all of Martin’s socks to the wall. And all the time, the question nags away at him: who is the little girl in the radiator, with whom his mum has urgent, whispered conversations each day?
'This is a funny but heartbreaking account of a mother's decline into the world of an Alzheimer's sufferer. I laughed and cried.' - Professor Sheila Hollins, British Medical Asocciation Medical Book Awards judge.
'Incredibly well written ... very entertaining and amusing', Dr Natalie Smith, Pulse Magazine.
HIGHLY COMMENDED in the Popular Medicine category at the British Medical Association Book Awards 2013
"Deeply loving yet wryly comic... The most moving portrait of this cruel disease you'll ever read" - The Daily Mail
THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE RADIATOR is an award-winning book. A tale of love, loss and family: the touching, sometimes hilarious and occasionally heartbreaking story of a man’s struggle to care for his mother after her diagnosis with Alzheimer’s disease.
Martin Slevin’s mum was a highly active, very intelligent and fiercely independent woman who ran her own business and ruled Martin and his father with a rod of iron. But after Martin’s dad dies, her life crumbles, and she becomes listless and forgetful. Eventually, she is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, and Martin puts his own life on hold to care for her. Together, they embark on a journey through the various stages of the condition; the destination is never in doubt, but along the way there are many lighter moments, as she shaves the dog’s bottom, holds sing-songs with an imaginary Irish band and pins all of Martin’s socks to the wall. And all the time, the question nags away at him: who is the little girl in the radiator, with whom his mum has urgent, whispered conversations each day?
'This is a funny but heartbreaking account of a mother's decline into the world of an Alzheimer's sufferer. I laughed and cried.' - Professor Sheila Hollins, British Medical Asocciation Medical Book Awards judge.
'Incredibly well written ... very entertaining and amusing', Dr Natalie Smith, Pulse Magazine.
