'Nick died in the southern hemisphere in spring. Now I am in Paris in spring. We were to have been here together. I am experiencing a double spring. Double the bitterness, double the beauty.'
Juliet Darling's memoir of the daily events surrounding the murder of her late partner, art curator Nick Waterlow, by his son Antony is a moving story of a deeply personal formative experience. It is a passionate and urgent look at the ordinariness of evil, the intractability of fate, and the interconnectedness of art and life. Ultimately it is a story about the power of love, and how love can be sustained through grief.
It is also a book about what it was like to live in the shadow of an impending death, a death that seemed to be foretold. It is about a grief that began long before death. For all involved, it seemed they were powerless to do anything to change the sinister course of events.
The story unfolds with utmost simplicity; stripped of any falsehood; refrained from comment as far as possible; it focuses on the everyday occurrences, the small banal events, which matter the most, and which form the greatest part of this tale of almost unbearable suffering.
A Double Spring is about powerlessness and grief, families and friendship, fear and trust, and anger and love.
