Death Comes for Peter Pan

by Joan Brady

Alice Kessler is a fighter and when she is told that her husband only has a few months left to live, she refuses to accept it. Instead Alice searches relentlessly for a doctor willing to offer a better prognosis and when she fails to find one in England, she takes her beloved Peter back to where they came from. America, the land of miracles. But Alice soon discovers that their fight is far from over. Death Comes for Peter Pan is a turbulent and unpredictable love story—the story of a young woman's fight for her husband's dignity and a powerful indictment of the politics that rule medicine today.

309 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Joan Brady is an American-British writer. She is the first woman and American to win the Whitbread Book of the Year Award for her novel Theory of War.
She was married to writer Dexter Masters and has a son who is also an author: Alexander Masters.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Reviews

[The Final Chapter · Rating 4 out of 5]

High 4. This is a devastating portrait of the iniquities of the medical system in the US. When Alice Wexler is told her husband is dying and that no medical treatment can prevent this outcome, they return to their American homeland. What follows is a tale of her passionate crusade to attain a more promising diagnosis, but as Alice's hopes of her country providing a second chance become shattered`in the face of the harsh realities of the Medicare system, her struggle becomes one of fighting for her husband's right to a dignified end. As she witnesses her husband's deterioration her self-reflection rveals hidden aspects of their relationship, and as any meaningful contact with her partner becomes more and more remote, we are witness to her growing emotional attachment to the one person who provides support. The author cuts through with scalpel-precision the layers of bureaucratic hypocrisy to reveal a health care system where poorly trained staff ensure passivity of patients through over-medication, and where those in such a vagetative state are regarded by those who manage the system, as mere 'product' to keep the coffers full. In the epilogue, Joan Brady reveals that she faced her own such struggle when she returned with her terminally-ill husband to the US. The questions she raises over the allocation of funds and the impersonal operation of the US health-care system, and the call for more discussion of 'mercy killings' contained within its pages brought condemnation across the pond, but this is a wonderful novel which deftly exposes social injustice.

[Chrissie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A poignant account of the end of a loved one's life.