Let go my hand

Despite his unshakable faith in the love of his second marriage, Larry struggles with the guilt of having wrecked one home to make another. His middle-aged sons, Ralph and Jack, never recovered from the divorce and still live each day in rebuke to their father. Even Larry's youngest and favourite son, Lou, born more than a decade later, hasn't escaped the corrosive effects of the long-buried secrets and lies that have come to define the family.

Everyone always assumed the mess could be sorted out later. But now Larry has a terminal illness. In the time he has left, he desperately wants two things: to heal the wounds he's caused and to choose when his own life ends. We join him as he sets off on what might be his final journey, a road trip across Europe just like the ones he used to take in the boys' summer holidays. But will his sons come together to aid in his dying wish? Is redemption or forgiveness possible any more? Can a family's love prove powerful enough to keep a dying man alive?

Let Go My Hand is a darkly hilarious and very moving novel about a singular family in the twenty-first century; through these vividly realized characters, it asks elemental questions about how we love, how we live, and what really matters in the end. Frequently playful, sometimes profound, always beautifully written, this novel shows the Booker-longlisted author of Self Help at his brilliant best, and confirms him as one of Britain's most intelligent and powerful writers.