SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2017 STELLA PRIZE

In the year before her death, as she struggled with an untreatable illness, Cory Taylor began to write about her experiences, the patterns of her life, and of those she had lost. Dying is about vulnerability and strength, courage and humility, and anger. It is also about the acceptance that it takes to live a good life and say goodbye to it in peace.

About the Author
Cory Taylor is the author of two celebrated novels: Me and Mr Booker, which was a regional winner in the Commonwealth Writers Prize, and My Beautiful Enemy which in 2014 was shortlisted for Australia's premier prize for fiction, the Miles Franklin Award. She died in July 2016. In 2017, Dying was shortlisted for the Stella Prize.

Reviews
Unsparing in its insights and observations, breathtaking in its courage and generosity. A thing of lightness and beauty * * Guardian * *
Serves as a reminder, amid the omnishambles of today's world, that life is transient and death final . . . Her luminous voice, touching on the fragility of life, the randomness of death . . . is one worth listening to * * The Times * *
An unflinching exploration into the experience, culture and language of dying . . . There is courage in abundance here. She looked death in the eye and, in her final months, produced a work that will help the rest of us approach our own demise with greater understanding, integrity and insight * * Observer * *
The book rings louder in my imagination the more time I spend apart from it . . . Taylor's prose is clear and direct, with flashes of surpassing loveliness . . . it has a startling offhand grace * * New York Times * *
A manual for the discussion of death, full of wisdom, vulnerability and reassurance . . . For all of Cory Taylor's acceptance of the inevitable, Dying contains a will to live on, and a conviction that for as long as we are remembered, we remain present * * Times Literary Supplement * *
Lucid, precise, unsentimental prose . . . its clear-sighted compassion might have something to teach any mortal * * Irish Times * *
This small, powerful book offers a clean engagement with life's conclusion: with clarity and courage, the author finds words to escort us towards silence -- HILARY MANTEL
A precise and moving memoir about the randomness of family, and an admirable intellectual response to the randomness of life and death. We should all hope for as vivid a looking-back, and as cogent a looking-forward, when we reach the end ourselves -- JULIAN BARNES
An inquiry into western society's dysfunctional relationship with mortality, and a luminous account of one writer's search for a good death of her own * * Guardian * *
Brave and funny, rare and honest, it sees her address everything from suicide (she considers it) to a bucket list (she doesn't have one; she's happy with what she's done in her life) . . . Beautiful * * The Bookseller, July Book of the Month * *


Awards
Short-listed for The Stella Prize 2017 (Australia).



Book Information
ISBN 9781782119784
Author Cory Taylor
Format Paperback
Page Count 160
Imprint Canongate Books
Publisher Canongate Books
Weight(grams) 143g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 12mm