LIVING IN THE LONG SHADOW by Suzanne Sherman - Spotlight
This poignant and compelling memoir, set in ’60s–’70s Los Angeles, traces a daughter’s experience of her mother’s schizophrenia and its lasting fallout before she ultimately reckons with her mother’s suicide and trusts in enduring love. When Suzanne Sherman is four, her musically gifted mother is struck by sudden-onset schizophrenia, altering the course of Suzanne’s childhood. Told in dual timelines—the years of her childhood and the two weeks following her mother’s suicide when Suzanne is eighteen— Living in the Long Shadow traces Suzanne’s coming of age in the shadow of mental illness as her family struggles with its far-reaching effects. As a teenager, Suzanne makes the difficult decision to leave her mother’s home and eventually moves in with her father and stepfamily. While her mother manages life on medication, Suzanne forms a friendship with her, sharing values, confidences, and a love of music and poetry. But a year after leaving Los Angeles for college, she learns that ...