Clinical case studies are practically extinct as a means of exploring and understanding psychiatric phenomena, despite the fact that they have served medicine and psychiatry well. From the case of Phineas Gage onwards, medicine has benefited from the careful study of single or small series of cases. Ironically, as the medical and psychiatric literatures have moved away from case studies, novelists and writers have embraced the form and put it to good use. In recent times, extended fictional and biographical accounts of psychopathology have included McGrath's Spider, McEwan's Enduring Love and Loudon's Relative Strangers. These accounts have succeeded in inviting the interested reader into the world that psychiatrists inhabit on a daily basis by bringing to life the abnormal experiences that we in psychiatry are familiar with, and rendering these understandable and meaningful as far as is possible.

Celia Robertson's book is in this tradition. It is about her grandmother, a poet who knew Virginia and Leonard Woolf and who maintained correspondence with Naomi Mitchison for many years. Robertson set out to paint a portrait of her grandmother; in the process she discovered the several lives she led and has written a masterly biography. Using letters, notebooks and the poetry of her grandmother, Joan Adeney Easdale (aka Sophie), Robertson has created a story that is both compelling and tragic, yet also inspiring and unforgettable.

The book is of interest to psychiatrists because it is a detailed exploration of the early development, adolescence and adult life of an individual who developed a psychosis later in life and whose conventional social life subsequently unravelled. The psychosis and its manifold impact are carefully described. There are instructive anecdotes that teach, more than any textbook can, how psychosis operates and how it may eventually sour relationships:

One of Sandy's rare memories is of his mother calling him into the sitting room to agree that Jesus Christ was in the room. Standing there, wanting to be helpful, all he could see were the blue swirls of the Persian rug. He felt desperately awkward but eventually said yes, he could see him, because there were slants of light coming in through the blinds and catching on the dust in the air. Maybe that was Jesus (p. 164).

Descriptions of incredible acts of generosity and kindness by strangers – a lawyer, a social worker, drinking companions – are included. These individuals reaffirm one's faith that a sense of community still exists and that kindness is its currency. Furthermore, in spite of the corrosive power of psychosis on family life, this is a story of the resilience of family ties and the triumph of filial love over adversity.

Robertson has brought her grandmother back to life for our benefit. The account is truthful and unsentimental. Sophie's portrait is drawn with warmth and affection. It is an intimate study of how a troubled spirit can still function sufficiently to live a life, albeit disorganised, that is worthy of our attention. Finally, it reminds us of the real person suffering within the turmoil of psychosis and that they, in Kant's terms, have intrinsic value and dignity and continue to deserve our concern.