The Other Side of You

“There’s no cure for being alive.”

Thus speaks Dr David McBride, a psychiatrist for whom death exerts an unusual draw. As a young child he witnessed the death of his six-year-old brother and it is this traumatic event that has shaped his own personality and choice of profession. One day a failed suicide, Elizabeth Cruikshank, is admitted to his hospital. She is unusually reticent and it is not until he recalls a painting by Caravaggio that she finally yields up her story.

We learn of Elizabeth Cruikshank’s dereliction of trust, and the man she has lost, through David’s narration. As her story unfolds, David finds his own life being touched by her account and a haunting sense that the other side’ of his elusive patient has a strange and disturbing resonance for him.

Set partly in Rome, The Other Side of You explores the power of love, and art, to invade and change our being and the difficult choices it forces us to reflect on and face. In graceful distinctive prose, this many-layered and thought-provoking novel penetrates the complexities of the human heart and suggests how lives and possibilities may be dramatically altered through another’s vision and understanding.