Lecretia's Choice

A Story of Love, Death and the Law

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Pub Date 14 Nov 2017 | Archive Date 18 Jul 2017
Text Publishing | Text Publishing Company

Description

“A brave, intimate book, both agonizing and uplifting, and unflinchingly honest.”—Andrew Solomon, National Book Award winner

“Matt Vickers asserts ‘stories are the most powerful force in the universe.’ This is the story of his wife, Lecretia, and her extraordinary advocacy in the face of ordinary tragedy. It will help change the world.”—Barbara Coombs Lee, President of Compassion and Choices USA

A successful young lawyer in Wellington, New South Wales, Lecretia Seales met and fell in love with Matt Vickers in 2003. In Lecretia’s Choice, Matt tells the story of their life together, and how it changed when his proud, fiercely independent wife was diagnosed with a brain tumor and forced to confront her own mortality.

The death she faced—slow, painful, dependent—was completely at odds with how she had lived her life. Lecretia wanted to die with dignity, to be able to say goodbye well, and not to suffer unnecessarily—but the law denied her that choice. With her characteristic spirit, she decided to mount a challenge in New Zealand’s High Court, but as the battle raged, Lecretia’s strength faded. She died on June 5, 2015, at the age of forty-two, the day after her family learned that the court had ruled against her.

Lecretia’s Choice is not only a moving love story but compulsory reading for everyone who cares about the dignity we afford terminally ill people who want to die on their own terms.

“A brave, intimate book, both agonizing and uplifting, and unflinchingly honest.”—Andrew Solomon, National Book Award winner

“Matt Vickers asserts ‘stories are the most powerful force in the...


A Note From the Publisher

US release in November 2017

US release in November 2017


Advance Praise

‘A brave, intimate book, both agonizing and uplifting, and unflinchingly honest.’—Andrew Solomon, National Book Award winner, president of PEN American Center

‘Matt Vickers asserts “stories are the most powerful force in the universe.” This is the story of his wife, Lecretia, and her extraordinary advocacy in the face of ordinary tragedy. It will help change the world.’—Barbara Coombs Lee, President of Compassion and Choices USA

‘A beautifully written story of courage, determination and a legal race against time.’—Professor Gillian Triggs, Australian Human Rights Commission

‘A tragic story, heart-breaking; so beautifully written…an almost un-put-downable book. Every home should have a copy, for a reminder, if nothing more, of what it is to have heart, humility and hope.’—Off the Tracks

‘As much the story of a relationship as it is of lawyer Lecretia Seales’ well-publicized effort to kick-start a law change to allow assisted dying, before she herself succumbed to cancer in June 2015…If anybody should have known how to make the most of the legal system, it was Seales. That this was not enough only makes her story as told here even sadder.’—North & South


‘A brave, intimate book, both agonizing and uplifting, and unflinchingly honest.’—Andrew Solomon, National Book Award winner, president of PEN American...


Available Editions

EDITION Other Format
ISBN 9781925355598
PRICE $16.95 (USD)
PAGES 320

Average rating from 12 members


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