Patient 1

Patient 1

Forgetting and Finding Myself

Summary

'Searingly honest and important' RACHEL CLARKE

Honest, intelligent and unsentimental, Patient 1 is a startling self-portrait written with wit and vulnerability, and a unique testament to the power of hope in the face of illness.


Charlotte Raven had never heard of Huntington's Disease when, in her mid-thirties, she discovered that her father was suffering from the illness. Life for her and her young family would never be the same again.

Frank and fearless, this is her memoir of coming to terms with this inherited neurodegenerative disease and its impact on her body, mind and memory. It is at once an act of self-preservation and a kind of reckoning: with the illness, with the person she once was and with the person she is now.

In an afterword, Raven's doctor Ed Wild - one of the country's leading experts in Huntington's - explains how doctors and patients like Charlotte are working together in the hope of one day eliminating this disease altogether.

'Insightful, frank and often moving...Raven writes with humour...and no small amount of courage' Guardian

Shortlisted for the RSL Christopher Bland Prize 2022

Reviews

  • Insightful, frank and often moving... Though there is an underlying note of deep sadness, more often she writes with humour, a dose of self mockery and no small amount of courage.
    Stephanie Merritt, Observer

About the authors

Charlotte Raven

Charlotte Raven was a journalist in the 1990s and her columns and articles have appeared frequently in the Guardian and New Statesman. She was a contributor to the Modern Review, and editor of the relaunched version in 1997. She lives in London.
Learn More

Edward Wild

Professor Edward Wild is Professor of Neurology at University College London, a Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London's Queen Square, and Associate Director of UCL Huntington's Disease Centre.
Learn More

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more