Assisted Dying Takes Center Stage in New Novel from Islington Writer and Professor Jeremy Gray.

When Robert, a doctor, learns that his older brother Jim, a successful rock ’n’ roll pianist he hasn’t seen in more than 20 years, has returned to England from the USA, he and his wife Barbara go to see him. While there, Jim’s wife Scarlet confirms Robert’s suspicion that Jim is in the advanced stages of cancer. Robert, against Barbara’s strongly held views, is on the verge of signing an open letter that will call for a public conversation about assisted dying, and finds himself moving quickly from supporting the idea in theory to confronting the thought of ending a person’s life in reality.

While Robert and Scarlet are drawn together, the conflicting feelings Robert and Jim have about their childhood culminate in a fierce row and Robert storms out. Jim becomes desperate for his brother to bring an end to his suffering before he loses the ability to play music, and Barbara urges Robert not to do anything that will destroy her trust in him. Robert is drawn back to visit Jim again, but will he risk sacrificing everything he’s ever worked for – his career, his marriage, even his freedom – for a brother he barely knows?

Jeremy Gray has taught at the Open University for many years and became a Professor there in 2002. He has been awarded prizes from the American and the European Mathematical Societies for his work on the history of mathematics. His play Creation 2.0, about human genetic modification, was performed in 2018.

Jeremy explains: “The emotional focus of this novel grew from a deepening awareness of how painful and miserable the last weeks and months of someone’s life can be, and how inadequately the medical profession often deals with it. You reach an age when your own mortality can no longer be ignored; you’ve watched your own parents and parents-in-law in their final weeks, have friends and relations who have endured weeks of suffering and had terrifyingly painful deaths. Assisted dying, assisted suicide, and euthanasia form a complicated, many-sided issue, one that digs deeply into so many aspects of how a life can be lived and shared with others.”