
The Archaeology of Loss
Life, love and the art of dying
by Sarah Tarlow
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Pub Date 20 Apr 2023 | Archive Date 20 Apr 2023
Pan Macmillan | Picador
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Description
When you find your husband lying dead, you think you will not forget a single detail of that moment. As an archaeologist, I like to get my facts right, and I will try my best to do so, but five years have passed since that day in 2016 and I am excavating my own unreliable memory. I cannot go back and check.
'Extraordinary, unflinching, wonderful, moving' - Nina Stibbe, author of Love, Nina
'This memoir has been compared to The Salt Path by Raynor Winn, and I can see why . . . In the end, there is so much love in this book. In writing such a meticulously honest book, she memorialises her cant-hating husband in the best way possible. I think he would be proud of her too.' The Times
Sarah Tarlow's husband Mark began to suffer from an undiagnosed illness, leaving him incapable of caring for himself. One day, about six years after he first started showing symptoms, Mark waited for Sarah and their children to leave their home before ending his own life.
Although Sarah had devoted her professional life to the study of death and how we grieve, she found that nothing could have prepared her for the reality of illness and the devastation of loss.
Fiercely vulnerable, deeply intimate and yet authoritative, The Archaeology of Loss describes a universal experience with an unflinching and singular gaze. With humour, intelligence and urgency, it is in its very honesty that it offers profound consolation.
'This book is a companion for anyone navigating the hardships of loss and uncertainty' - Octavia Bright, author of This Ragged Grace
'A tender and big-hearted embrace of a book . . . A poetic excavation of loss, grief and ritual.' - Graham Caveney, author of The Boy with the Perpetual Nervousness
Available Editions
EDITION | Other Format |
ISBN | 9781529099539 |
PRICE | £16.99 (GBP) |
PAGES | 288 |
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews

Some books feel impossible to write about, due to not being able to find words good enough to do them justice. This is one. Searingly honest, devastating and heart wrenching yet hauntingly beautiful, fascinating and heart warming at the same time, As someone who’s experienced both losing someone to a neurological illness with no cure or treatment and my own share of health issues, I can honestly say every word, feeling and thought expressed in this rang painfully true and will stay nestled in my heart for a long time to come.,