'Such a skilled and engaging writer'

Deborah Levy

'Schreiber's prose is gorgeous, practically silken'

Lauren Groff

Nothing in this world lasts forever.

Exhausted and isolated, numbed to his feelings by all-consuming work, Daniel Schreiber sought escape in Venice: the iconic city that we both love and pre-emptively mourn, as it gradually sinks beneath the waves.

As he wanders its waterways and historic buildings, Schreiber confronts how since the death of his father, grief has been his daily companion - and how this personal loss has been magnified by the many larger, collective losses that the world has faced in recent years.

With characteristic intelligence, curiosity and compassion, Schreiber considers how other writers have faced their own losses - from Joan Didion and Rebecca Solnit, to Judith Butler and Sigmund Freud - to finally arrive at an understanding of how grief offers us our best and perhaps only chance to find our way back to life.