The twilight of Edna O’Brien: son chronicles novelist’s dedication to her craft and the dread of loss

Carlo Gébler describes mother’s doomed battle to complete a final book as age and infirmity sapped her powers – and his own feelings about her passingAfter visiting his dying mother in London, Carlo Gébler returned to his rural home in Northern Ireland one night and encountered a hedgehog sitting on the doormat. A thought bubbled up: his mother had died and returned as this woodland creature.In fact his mother, the novelist Edna O’Brien, was still alive, and not reincarnated, but his mind insisted otherwise. “At that moment that’s what I believed. And then of course I stopped believing it because I knew it wasn’t true.” Continue reading...