The Life of Stuff

Book excerpt: "Only after her mother's death does Susannah Walker discover how much of a hoarder she had become. Over the following months, sorting through a dilapidated house filled to the brim with rubbish and treasures, she goes in search of a woman she'd never really known in life. Hoping to piece together her mother's story and make sense of their troubled relationship, what emerges from the mess of scattered papers, discarded photographs and an extraordinary amount of stuff is the history of a sad and fractured family, haunted by dead children, divorce and alcohol."--