Book Review: Half In Love by Linda Gray Sexton

Title: Half In Love: Surviving the Legacy of Suicide
Author: Linda Gray Sexton
Publisher: Counterpoint
Publication Date: January 1, 2011
Paperback: 336 pages
ISBN: 978-1582437187
Genre: Memoir

From the Tour:

Despite experiencing the agony of witnessing her mother’s multiple suicide attempts, the last of which was successful, Linda Gray Sexton found herself gripped by the same strong tentacles of mental anguish. Falling into the familiar grooves of her mother’s relentless depression, Sexton tries once, twice, three times to kill herself—even though she is a daughter, sister, wife, and most importantly, a mother.

Sexton unsparingly describes her struggle to escape the magnetism of her mother and the undertow of depression that engulfed her life. Her powerful prose drags readers into her imperviously dark mental state. It conveys her urgent need to alleviate the internal pain, a need that becomes compulsive and considers no one.

But unlike her mother, hers is a story of triumph. Through the help of family, therapy, and medicine, Sexton confronted deep-seated issues, outlived her mother, and curbed the haunting cycle of suicide she once seemed destined to inherit.

Over a million people kill themselves annually–and their families, too, are prisoners of their depression and suicidal urges. Half in Love speaks for them all.

My Review:

Deeply emotional, raw, and profoundly honest, Half In Love by Linda Gray Sexton is a memoir of her legacy of suicide. Linda’s mother, the famous poet Anne Sexton, attempted suicide numerous times throughout Linda’s childhood. Linda writes about how she and her sister Joy dealt with their mother’s illness and how Linda was affected. In 1974 while studying at Harvard, Linda learns of her mother’s death, which at first pulled her family closer together, but eventually it tore them apart. Sexton writes in a non-linear manner to convey the full depth of the legacy that was passed on to her. She speaks of her happiness while marrying Jim, and with the birth of their sons Nathaniel and Gabe, yet while Sexton shares many fond memories, she also shares her deeply personal life stories of her depression, being diagnosed as bipolar, her suicide attempts and life in and out of psychiatric wards. Half In Love is more than a personal memoir; it helps to explain what severe depression feels like in extremely vivid details as well as the numerous emotions felt before Linda’s suicide attempts and after. Sexton shares with the reader her fears of being like her mother, of the anxieties that surround her as she continually seeks counseling and her feelings of inadequacy and loneliness. Sexton openly draws the reader into her mind to witness what life is like for someone not only struggling with bipolar disorder but also with suicidal tendencies. Half in Love is a beautiful, tender, and deeply emotional look into a world many fear or are uncomfortable talking about. Sexton wants to dispel myths and teach the readers about these taboo topics. At times I found Half In Love to be painful to read yet Linda is an extraordinarily gifted writer and she easily draws the reader deep into her life, both past and present, almost as if she is in the reader’s home sharing her story over coffee. While the topics of the book are not easy to read nor are the details easy to understand, but at times heart breaking, I believe Half In Love is a book that should be read by everyone and definitely one to be shared and discussed.

About the Author:

Linda Gray Sexton was born in Newton, Massachusetts in 1953 and graduated from Harvard University in 1975. She is the daughter of the Pulitzer Prize winning poet, Anne Sexton, and has edited several books of her mother’s poetry and a book of her mother’s letters, as well as writing a memoir about her life with her mother, “Searching for Mercy Street: My Journey Back To My Mother, Anne Sexton.” “Rituals,” “Mirror Images,” “Points of Light,” and “Private Acts” are her four published and widely read novels. “Points of Light” was made into a Hallmark Hall of Fame Special for television.

“Searching for Mercy Street” was named a New York Times Book Review Notable Book and reviewed to overwhelming critical acclaim. In the New York Times, Michiko Kakutani described the book this way: “Powerful and affecting…a candid, often painful, depiction of a daughter’s struggles to come to terms with her powerful and emotionally troubled mother. Sexton writes with compelling urgency and candor…a disturbing portrait of a mercurial, impossible and magnetic woman.”

Join Linda’s community of fans and learn more about her at her official website.

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I received a complimentary copy of Half In Love by Linda Gray Sexton from TLC Book Tours to be a part of this tour and offer my honest review of the book. Receiving a complimentary copy in no way reflected my review of aforementioned book.

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