Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bad News | 1992 | Edward St. Aubyn | Buy |
| 2 | אין דבר | 1992 | Edward St. Aubyn | N/A |
| 3 | Never Mind | 1992 | Edward St. Aubyn | Buy |
| 4 | Some Hope | 1994 | Edward St. Aubyn | Buy |
| 5 | Mother’s Milk | 2005 | Edward St. Aubyn | Buy |
| 6 | Toivoa sopii | 2014 | Edward St. Aubyn | N/A |
| 7 | At Last | 2011 | Edward St. Aubyn | Buy |
Edward St. Aubyn’s Patrick Melrose series is one of the most acclaimed sequences in contemporary British fiction. Beginning with Never Mind (1992), which depicts the sexual abuse Patrick suffers at the hands of his father at the family’s estate in the south of France, the novels follow Patrick through decades of self-destruction and slow recovery. Bad News tracks his heroin-fueled trip to New York to collect his father’s ashes. Some Hope finds him attempting sobriety at an aristocratic party. Mother’s Milk and At Last deal with his mother’s decline and death.
The books are written with extraordinary control. St. Aubyn renders horrifying events in elegant prose and finds savage comedy in the manners and hypocrisies of the English upper class. The series was adapted into a 2018 television miniseries starring Benedict Cumberbatch, bringing the novels to a wider audience. Reading them in order is strongly recommended since each book builds on the emotional weight of what came before.