The Man Who Walked Away

In a trance-like state, Albert walks – from Bordeaux to Poitiers, from Chaumont to Mâcon, and farther afield to Turkey, Austria, Russia – all over Europe. When he walks, he is called a vagrant, a mad man. He is chased out of towns and villages, ridiculed and imprisoned. When the reverie of his walking ends, he's left wondering where he is, with no memory of how he got there. His past exists only in fleeting images.

Loosely based on the case history of Albert Dadas, a psychiatric patient in the hospital of St. André in Bordeaux in the nineteenth century, The Man Who Walked Away imagines Albert's wanderings and the anguish that caused him to seek treatment with a doctor who would create a diagnosis for him, a narrative for his pain.

In a time when mental health diagnosis is still as much art as science, Maud Casey takes us back to its tentative beginnings and offers us an intimate relationship between one doctor and his patient as, together, they attempt to reassemble a lost life. Through Albert she gives us a portrait of a man untethered from place and time who, in spite of himself, kept setting out, again and again, in search of wonder and astonishment.

“A haunting, deeply empathetic and rigorously intelligent novel. It is also a seamless marvel of construction and language. The Man Who Walked Away cast a spell from which I never wished to wake” –  Alice Sebold, author of The Lovely Bones

“Casey's compassionate, joyful, lyrical voice ... guides us with kindness, gusto and humour” –  George Saunders

“Genealogy is a brilliant, searing exploration of family legacies and mental illness. Maud Casey writes with poignant lucidity and radiance, and this remarkably original novel is full of compassionate vision and clear-eyed grace” –  Rene Steinke, author of the National Book Award finalist Holy Skirts

“A bold writer who moves easily among the different voices in Genealogy, proving that it's possible to be protean and authentic at the same time. This novel about the bonds and intricacies of family life is as haunting as it is compelling” –  Meg Wolitzer, author of The Position

“Casey is a stand-up philosopher posing vexing questions about human existence. She's funny, inventive … dazzling narrative dare” –  New York Times Book Review

“A technical tour de force – the language of “madness” is rendered with beauty, empathy and, above all, music. Perhaps deliberately, the entire book recalls a fugue … Not a word is wasted and characters are shaped with a gossamer touch. In its earliest days, psychiatry was considered medicine for the soul – a fitting description for this fine book *****” –  Richard Tarrant, The Lady

“The story is dazzlingly intelligent, and enchanting, the kind that we rarely read in these cynical, 'sophisticated' times … The lyrical language has the transparent precision of fine-glass engraving … This is a novel about empathy and perception … There are many wonderful books that I won't get to re-read. This, however, will be one of the exceptions. I anticipate a plethora of awards for this novel, Casey's third. Reading The Man Who Walked Away is like standing near the ocean and watching the perfect wave” –  Irish Examiner