Changes

|title=Umbrella

|author=Will Self

|publisher=Bloomsbury

|date=August 2012

|website=http://will-self.com/

|video=

|summary=If the phrase 'non-linear stream of consciousness modernistic approach' doesn't fill you with dread, then maybe you will agree with the Booker judges on this book's merits, but it's a frustrating and confusing read that is, for me, style over substance. One to avoid.

}}

Will Self's ''Umbrella'' spans a century taking three interwoven strands. One features Audrey Dearth, who in 1918 is a munitions worker who falls ill with encephalitis lethargica, a brain disease that spread over Europe after the Great War rendering many of its victims speechless and motionless. She is incarcerated in Friern hospital where, in the early 1970s a psychiatrist, Zach Busner wakes her from her stupor using a new drug. In the final thread, in 2010 the asylum has closed and the now retired Busner travels across north London seeking the truth about his encounter with his former patient. While that sounds like a fascinating story in its own right, be warned. Self's approach is ambitiously modernistic making this a very heavy going tome even by Self's standards.