When her father dies, Kay Wilkinson can't cry. Over ten years,
Alzheimer's had steadily eroded this erudite man into a paranoid
lunatic. Surely one's own father passing should never come as such a
relief.
Both medical professionals, Kay and her husband Cyril have seen too many
elderly patients in similar states of decay. Although healthy and vital
in their early fifties, the couple fears what may lie ahead. Determined
to die with dignity, Cyril makes a modest proposal. To spare themselves
and their loved ones such a humiliating and protracted decline, they
should agree to commit suicide together once they've both turned eighty.
When their deal is sealed, the spouses are blithely looking forward to
another three decades together.
But then they turn eighty.
By turns hilarious and touching, playful and grave, Should We Stay or
Should We Go portrays twelve parallel universes, each exploring a
possible future for Kay and Cyril. Were they to cut life artificially
short, what would they miss out on? Something terrific? Or something
terrible? Might they end up in a home? A fabulous luxury retirement
village, or a Cuckoo's Nest sort of home? Might being demented end up
being rather fun? What future for humanity awaits--the end of
civilization, or a Valhalla of peace and prosperity? What if cryogenics
were really to work? What if scientists finally cure aging?
Both timely and timeless, Lionel Shriver addresses serious themes--the
compromises of longevity, the challenge of living a long life and still
going out in style--with an uncannily light touch. Weaving in a host of
contemporary issues, from Brexit and mass migration to the coronavirus,
Shriver has pulled off a rollicking page-turner in which we never have
to mourn perished characters, because they'll be alive and kicking in
the very next chapter.
