Our Billie

Description

An inspiring story of how one family overcomes the worst tragedy imaginable 'An astonishing work' - Joanne Harris Every parent's worst nightmare became a reality for Ian Clayton. On a short holiday break in Hay-on-Wye he took his nine-year-old twins canoeing, and in a freak accident his daughter Billie was drowned. In a remarkably frank and vivid way Clayton describes what happened on that spring day, his desperate attempts to save his two children, and then what it felt like two years later to come face to face with the men who hired out the canoe. But Our Billie is not a story of bitterness and recrimination. Instead it's the story of how a family attempts to come to terms with something which makes no sense at all. Through his memories of Billie and his wonderfully affectionate portrait of the small town in Yorkshire where the family has lived for generations, he weaves a story of loss and remembering, of gratitude and forgiveness.

Ian Clayton has been a freelance writer and broadcaster for twenty-five years. His highly acclaimed memoir of a life in music, Bringing It All Back Home, was published in 2007. He has presented programmes on BBC TV, ITV Yorkshire, the Discovery Channel, and regularly on radio. He has also led workshops in prisons, hospitals, schools and art centres. Ian was born and still lives in west Yorkshire, with his partner Heather and son Edward. He likes listening to jazz and blues, reading about folklore and music hall, and indulging in tap-room conversation and gentle subversion.

Ian has taken the worst experience a parent can endure and has spun it into a love poem of such potency and tenderness that even grief takes a back seat... By the end of it we all love Billie; we all mourn her untimely passing, and we are all enriched for having known her. -- Joanne Harris The heartbreak jumps out from these pages, but there is hope in them too. Ian's writing celebrates his daughter's life, and he, his wife and son have somehow found a way to grieve for her, remember her and include her in their family without being maudlin -- Jenni Murray