In her frank and unflinching portrait of her early years in Derbyshire, and later her adolescence and early 20s, Hilary Mantel moved from writing fiction to seize the copyright in her own narrative.

Charting a fractured and sometimes tense family life, the account moves on to her university years and the chronic and devastating pain of an undiagnosed illness.

Giving Up The Ghost is the much-loved and admired novelist's memoir, first published in 2003 and repeated here as a tribute to the author who died in September 2022.

'She is by turns facetious, matter-of-fact, visionary and comical but always totally riveting.' Daily Telegraph
'Simply astonishing - clear and true.' Guardian
‘What a remarkable writer she is. She is piercingly, even laceratingly observant … a very startling and daring memoir; the more I read it the more unsettling it becomes.’ Helen Dunmore

Read by Patience Tomlinson
Abridged and produced by Jill Waters

A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4 Show less