Bøger af Hazel McHaffie

Set within the topical debate about size-zero models, celebrities changing gender, runaway teenagers and an image-obsessed culture, this novel gets inside the skin of a family torn apart by distorted perceptions and conflicting identities.Three narrators tell the story.India Grayson is only 8 when her beloved father, Victor, suddenly vanishes, leaving a pile of clothes neatly folded on a windy beach in Scotland. India is devastated and bargains with God: I'll stop eating chocolate if you send my Daddy back to me. Now 15 and seriously anorexic, she's convinced that she heard his voice on a crowded London station, and sets out to track him down, aided and abetted by her best friend, Mercedes.Mother, Tonya, is torn between mollifying her troubled daughter, and her grave doubts about the man she married. Who exactly was he? What dark secrets were haunting him? Could he be involved somehow in the disappearance of three teenage girls? Just how healthy was his relationship with his daughter? How much information should she share with India? Or the police?Chris Taylor is a grieving parent struggling to find security in a florist shop in London, who takes in a runaway 16 year old schoolgirl, and helps her find a way into her chosen career. The mystery behind Victor's disappearance is much more challenging than Tonya ever dreamed of, and the revelation when it comes rocks the fragile truce she has established with her daughter.This book will resonate with everyone who has ever agonised over their own body image or identity, and any parent who must learn to relinquish control to their child. It brings medical ethics alive and puts it firmly at the heart of everyday family dynamics.

This study includes insights from over 100 parents' experience of bereavement, from pregnancy through to infants up to 13 months old. It provides guidance to health professionals on how services may be improved and describe the effect of decision-making on parents.

When Alzheimers reveals a family secret, will anyone remain unscathed?

Time is running out for four-year-old Sebastian Zair. A rare blood disorder means that a stem-cell transplant is his only hope of surviving past childhood. His mother places her trust in the Pemberton Fertility Centre and a controversial IVF procedure which will allow her to select an embryo that is the same tissue type as Sebastian - to create a saviour sibling. But what she doesn't know is that the sword of Damocles is hanging over the Pemberton. A Nigerian couple, the Opakanjos, have just given birth to twins through IVF, but only one is their biological child. Someone has made a monumental mistake. With a major enquiry under way and pro-life campaigners on the warpath, both families are faced with agonising personal choices as well as the intrusions of an unscrupulous journalist. Will they break under the strain? Will Sebastian survive? REVIEWS: There are very few novels which deal with the issues of contemporary medical ethics in the lively and intensely readable way which Hazel McHaffie's books do. ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH McHaffie's books are skillfully written to bring out the complex ethical issues we as doctors, nurses, patients, or relatives, may face in dealing with difficult issues... These books are a welcome development of what has been called the narrative turn in medical ethics. THE BRITISH MEDICAL JOURNAL

Naomi is haunted by a troubling secret. Stuggling to come to terms with her husband's death, her biggest dread is finding out that Adam knew of her betrayal. He left behind an intimate diary - but dare she read it? Will it set her mind at rest - or will it destroy the fragile control she has over her grief? Caught by the unfolding story, Naomi discovers more than she bargained for. Adam writes of his feelings for her, his challenging career, his burning ambition. How one by one his dreams evaporate when he is diagnosed with a degenerative condition. Motor Neurone Disease. How he resolves to mastermind his own exit at a time of his choice...but time is one luxury he can't afford. Soon he won't be able to do it alone. Can he ask a friend, or even a relative to commit murder? Adam's fierce determination to retain control of his own body against insurmountable odds fills his journal with a passion and drive that transcend his situation, and transfix the reader. A startingly clear - sighted and courageous story, this novel explores the collision between uncomprimising laws, complex loyalties and human compassion. REVIEWS There are few novels which deal with the issues of contemporary medical ethics in the lively and intensely readable way that [these] do.- ALEXANDER MCCALL SMITH