Maggie O'Farrell, The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox

Fiction by Maggie O'Farrell on three women's life stories around the closure of the psychiatric asylums.
Esme is sent to a mental asylum at age 16, not uncommon for wayward women in the 1930s. 61 year later, the asylum is being closed and her niece, Iris, is told she must come get her. Iris didn't even know Esme existed and takes her back to what had been the family home. She finds her aunt sane and articulate. When Esme finds that Kitty is alive in a nursing home, albeit suffering from Alzheimer's, she wants to visit her. The family secrets that led to Esme's incarceration might finally be exposed. Maggie O'Farrell's novel has received positive reviews with the New Statesman saying, "The haunting final pages are among the finest O'Farrell has ever written.