Two things came to mind as I was reading Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett (and I’ll refer to this quote about cultural promiscuity for context) –

01. The story highlighted so much of what was explored in Strangers to Ourselves in terms of diagnosis, identity, support services and mental health. It’s essentially the fictional version of Aviv’s book.

02. I recently started watching Vanderpump Rules (yes, all 11 seasons. Don’s ask, refer to quote). Scheana says of her S2 marriage to Shay (who had previously undisclosed mental health and addiction issues) something along the lines of, “I know it was for better or worse, I just didn’t expect the worse so soon…”

Imagine Me Gone begins in 1960s London with the story of Margaret and her fiancé, John. Their whirlwind romance is interrupted when John is hospitalised for depression. Margaret is faced with a choice: carry on with their wedding plans despite what she knows of his condition, or back away from the suffering it may bring her. She decides to marry him.

Fast forward: they have three children and John is struggling to stay employed. He notes that ‘…there was no margin for him being sick.’ Financially there was no margin for the family, and equally, there was a distinct lack of support for John (his parents viewing his depression as a ‘phase’ not to be indulged).

Margaret and the children bear the legacy of John’s mental health struggles in different ways. Margaret remains stoic. The eldest child, Michael, is a brilliant, anxious music fanatic who makes sense of the world through humour and a wild imagination. He can’t find a meaningful connection with his father, but as he becomes an adult, the similarities between them emerge, and Michael’s mental health also deteriorates. As John thinks, this late-found ‘common ground’ is not of of the sort he wished for.

Cecilia, the ‘responsible’ one, (and anxious in a different way to Michael), plays the role of the peace-keeper, managing all of the family relationships. The youngest is Alec – ambitious and tightly controlled – again, the anxiety expressed differently.

Narration is rotated between all members of the family, some voices stronger than others. The character of Michael offers Haslett the most creative license, with his bouts of mania, and his deep love of disco providing ample (and sometimes superfluous) material.

Cecilia resonated most for me – her sense of duty, combined with a legacy of (unwarranted) guilt and grief was well written. When John dies, Celia reflects that they (the family) had to convince themselves ‘…that we were more than just functions of loss.’ This observation speaks to the fact that John’s depression defined the family for many years. Of her father’s depression, she says –

I’d never stopped to imagine that it wasn’t my responsibility.

The acknowledgment that she can’t ‘solve’ her father’s and Michael’s problems is significant (I won’t say more for fear of spoilers).

I enjoyed this book but it wasn’t as emotionally challenging as I was anticipating. I think Haslett spread himself too thin by having five narrators – structurally, it would have made sense to drop John and keep the focus on the ‘observers’, however, John’s initial sections capture his fear and the isolation of depression. The risk with multiple narrators is a loss of rhythm, and Imagine Me Gone suffered from this – I wanted an immersive read but it didn’t quite meet my expectations.

2.5/5

I usually finish reviews with a food reference, but in the case of this novel, I’m taking a leaf out of Madame Bibi’s book, and ending with some music. Michael’s love of disco is central to his character, and he refers to Donna Summer and one of the most influential disco songs ever written (of course, when I was dancing to Summer, it most often included  Bronski Beat).