After thirteen years together, Sarah Tarlow’s husband Mark began to suffer from an undiagnosed illness, which rapidly left him incapable of caring for himself.

Life – an intense juggling act of a demanding job, young children and looking after a depressed and frustrated parner – became hard. One day, Mark waited for Sarah and their children to leave their home before ending his own life. Although Sarah had devoted her professional life as an archaeologist to the study of death and how we grieve, she found that nothing had prepared her for the reality of illness and the devastation of loss.

The Archaeology of Loss is a fiercely vulnerable, deeply intimate and yet unflinchingly direct memoir which describes a universal experience.