The Madness of Grief: A Memoir of Love and Loss

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Coles' faith is, unsurprisingly for a vicar, central to his life and his understanding of the world.

I had to laugh out loud when Richard likened David to Imelda in the shoe department - that was how Steve referred to me. There were moving moments and it was touching in places, but overall it was a hard going and I had to force myself to finish this. Best of all, the main character is female, which is a bit of rarity in this genre, especially from a male author. I think, for some time, I hadn’t been open about my sexuality and when I was, there was a release of inner tension, and that became a crisis.

It reminded me of the cheesy tv drama technique of slowing down the pace while camera pans to each person for their reaction. Coles is honest about the difficulties that living with an addict can cause but at times berates himself for not being kind or understanding enough during David’s life.

The events cover a mere several days, but their impact is Titanic on the lives of those in Jane’s immediate circle. Whilst Coles had grown accustomed to David's quirks and side-effects due to his illness, his death was sudden and unexpected. Coles sought permission from David’s family, he says, who agreed that an honest account might be soothing or helpful to others. I found Coles' own writing about his husband beautiful, and the poems he drew on affecting, but reading this book made me reflect on how cold religion leaves me.George hides his grief behind a gruff and manly exterior, which also shields, among other things, his tender and loving feelings toward Jane. After reading the first chapters I was rooting for Jane and certainly proud of her for the woman she becomes despite the traumas and heartbreaking obstacles she had to endure. Over the years, the couple learned to accept or at least tolerate one another’s major vices: in Coles a need for public attention, and in David an increasingly prominent drinking problem. I knew Coles by reputation as one of the UK’s media-friendly vicars like Kate Bottley, and I vaguely remember hearing that his partner died in December 2019, likely through others’ engagement with his announcement on Twitter. He will also discuss his late husband’s addiction to alcohol, an addiction that eventually killed him.

Yet that morning he was suffering a private crisis: Coles had just been told David might not survive surgery for a catastrophic gastrointestinal bleed. David had made the first move after one of Richard’s sermons, later sending him a text asking, “Don’t you get it?I didn’t particularly want to be a pop star, so when it came along it was never something I longed for, and never something I couldn’t imagine not doing,” he says. One widow gave Coles her late husband’s accordion, an instrument he’s always been keen to learn (he can so far play three songs, including the Godfather theme). He co-presents Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4 and appears, from time to time, on QI, Have I Got News For You, and Would I Lie To You?