When I read Joan Brady's book "Theory of War" in the early 90's I was blown away. It was so sad and so true. Thereafter, I would watch at bookstores for a new book by her but never found one. This was before the internet and I would ask occasionally at bookstores, but no one seemed to have heard of her. Then a couple of years ago I noticed a review by her of another book which I think was in the Times Literary Supplement and I thought that she at least was writing and surely she had written more books. With a little further digging and thanks to Abebooks, I obtained a lovely Secker & Warburg 1996 1st edition of Death Comes for Peter Pan. Of course I loved it but it was a more complex book, sort of like reading Lovely Bones and then The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold. The difference is that I don't think Ms Sebold really showed her genius until The Almost Moon. Theory of War was a masterpiece.

The abuse of children (in Theory of War the story of the white slave trade in America that occurred shortly after the Cvil War, where white children, many orphans, were sold as slaves to farmers) draws unconditional sympathy. I sat and cried.

In Peter Pan, the author also portrays a clear and real injustice, the treatment of elderly Medicare patients, in care facilities, in the US. Her afterword confirms this and hopefully things have improved since the writing of this book. The description of the warehousing of sick elderly people and the callous miserly allocation of funds for their care in this book is shocking.

Ms Brady is far too good a writer to use her characters just to make a point .The various characters in the book are not entirely sympathetic nor are the bad guys wholly bad. The main character Alice, in her thirties, struggles for proper care for her husband, thirty years her senior, when he develops a debilitating degenerative brain condition. Alice is young and desperate to keep her husband with her. She reacts in what she believes is a principled approach, that she will do the very best for her husband. That means demanding the best. Adult children sometimes have similar reactions to a dying parent. They have unreasonable expectations of hospitals and the medical profession. They want any medical procedure that might help even if the benefits are shortlived. They expect their doctors to care on a personal level and show that. They are inevitably in conflict with the medical system

This is the story of Alice's journey through the medical professions of two countries. Having been frustrated by The British system who essentially advise no active intervention, Alice suddenly and desperately remembers that the American medical profession is wonderful. No more cold British types. She wants an American smile and an American "we can do anything attitude". She decides to move her husband to the US and does so immediately, callously sending their young child off to boarding school in Switzerland. (She picked up something from the British there ). Her subsequent conflict with the American medical system is inevitable.
Alice is not always an admirable character. Her deference to her much older husband has prevented her from maturing and developing her own intelligence and independence. She worships her self centred husband and has lived through him for years having nothing of her own (like a job), Hence her genuine grief is mixed with hysteria at the thought of losing him. Her own father reminds her of her child and that she must communicate with and comfort him. Alice is unmoved. She must save her husband. Alice is courageous and self-sacrificing. She spends every possible moment at the hospital. Almost from the start she is challenged by the hospital about a discharge date. Alice goes through the initial normal disbelief that it is not enough to be desperately ill, indeed dying, to be kept in an active treatment hospital. She works on keeping him there sometimes a day at a time, pleading, threatening but faced with the challenge of finding longer term care for him. This leads her to the nursing home issue.

This book is a very interesting and complex story and it is about far more than Alice's ongoing medical challenge. It is never boring and full of surprises. Layers of history are explored in the families of Alice and her husband Peter and this is an equally interesting story, moving back and forth from the American midwest to New York and Washington. Family secrets are explored and family secrets are often shocking.

This is a great read and a good story. I know I've said it before but it is always a delight in a modern novel to find a plot. ( )