9 tcf.org.uk COMPASSION | BOOK REVIEWS This book is a very interesting, engaging and meaningful read. It’s a bit like an onion, for want of a better comparison, in that it has layer upon layer; one of those books you could read a dozen times and find something you’ve missed with every re-read. At the heart of the book are the stories of two people, a bereaved mother trying to make sense of her drastically altered world, and an amazing young man whose life was rich and fulfilled and meaningful despite his sudden death at the age of twenty-five. Raphaël Coleman (who his mother calls Raph) was a student zoologist who could see how climate change was affecting the natural world and decided to do something about it. He travelled around the world working in wildlife sanctuaries, he created the international wildlife worker’s network, and he campaigned with ‘Extinction Rebellion’. He also used some of the family land for a rewilding project and now there are rabbits, butterflies, wild flowers, bees and other wildlife in a place that was becoming barren and desolate. Raph was in South Africa in February 2020, making a documentary about poaching and black mambas, when he collapsed and died very suddenly from what was eventually shown to be a malfunction of the electrical activity of his heart. As Raphaël’s life ended his mother’s hell began, compounded by the pandemic lockdowns, and she documents the first year of her grief in this book. She asks herself so many of the questions we all ask; what do you say when someone asks how many children you have? How can you go on with your own life when your child's life has ended? Will you ever feel any better? Liz finds comfort from the outpouring of love and grief from Raph’s many friends, from other members of her family and from engaging in the causes that her son had been so passionate about. She feels a real connection with the natural world and takes up wild swimming in sometimes freezing water. She also wonders whether the signs she sees, like birds or butterflies, are her son trying to contact her or the product of her own mind desperately trying to reconnect with him. Liz conducts a continuous conversation with Raph throughout the book, all the time thinking ‘is this really Raph I’m talking to or is it my own brain fooling me into thinking I am?’ At one point she has a session with a medium, because she’s decided to try everything, and finds comfort in that. For me this is another very interesting layer of this book. No matter what we believe, or don’t believe, we all have a continuing relationship with our children until the end of our lives and I’ve not often seen that described so well. Another layer is the story, within the story, of climate change and the problems it's already causing the world, with much worse to come. My only prior knowledge of ‘Extinction Rebellion’ was what I’ve read in the press, with the activists depicted as deranged nuisances. I found it very enlightening to see it from the other point of view; young people, and some older people, who can see what’s coming and are determined to do something about it, whatever the cost to themselves. It has certainly made me think and to want to read more about it. In the end this is a story of great love, overwhelming grief and a struggle for survival by a wounded but determinedly resilient mother. I thoroughly recommend it. Your Wild and Precious Life’ by Liz Jensen reviewed by Mary Hartley Liz Jensen is a novelist and the mother of the wildlife biologist and ecological activist Raphaël Coleman, who died at the age of 25 from an undiagnosed heart condition. She is the author of eight novels and the grief memoir Your Wild and Precious Life: on Grief, Hope and Rebellion, published by Canongate. lizjensen.com
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