Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies
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By Maddie Mortimer
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Under attack from within, Lia tries to keep the landscapes of her past, her present and her body separate. But time and bodies are porous, and unpredictable.
Something gleeful and malign is moving in Lia’s body. It shape-shifts down the banks of her canals, leaks through her tissue, nooks and nodes. It taps her trachea like the bones of a xylophone. It’s spreading.
Lia’s story is told, in part, by the very thing that’s killing her; a malevolent voice that wanders her systems, learning her from the inside-out. The novel moves between her past and her present as we come to understand the people that have shaped her life.
In turn, each of these take up their place in the battle raging within Lia’s body, at the centre of which dances the murderous narrator and a boy nicknamed ‘Red’ – the toxic chemo that is Lia’s last hope.
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Absolutely loved this book even though the main theme is a young mother dying of breast cancer. It is superbly well written and completely original in style and form, both of which change from chapter to chapter. It is dark and funny, sensitive and interesting, wholly engrossing, very entertaining and very sad. It's also about so much more than living with a terminal illness: growing up, young love, bullying, families. A really great read.
