THE DIVORCE DIARIES

Funny, honest, confronting – a compelling and tragi-comic memoir of a marriage break-up.
‘I hear you're divorced?' a friend greets me. ‘Congratulations!'

The two years before Sarah Quigley left her marriage were two of the hardest in her life. Divorce, however positive a spin you put on it, can feel like failure. What finally drove her to leave was fear. Fear for her safety, fear of the future – and fear that she would end up hating the person she'd loved.

Moving into a tiny rooftop apartment in the glossy heart of Berlin, she began the difficult, heart-breaking process of recovery. It was out of the welter of post-break-up emotions – grief, disbelief, loneliness, and finally a kind of acceptance – that The Divorce Diaries was born. Not only did Quigley want to write herself out of the darkness, she wanted to help other women in similar situations feel less alone. Revisiting the tumultuous months leading up to exiting her marriage, she writes with a striking mix of humor, honesty, and poignancy. She shares both her darkest and most hilarious moments as a divorcee, then steps back into a changed world of dating – all set against Berlin's colorful bohemian backdrop.

SARAH QUIGLEY is a novelist, non-fiction writer, and critic. Born in New Zealand, she has a D.Phil. in Literature from the University of Oxford. Her debut novel, After Robert, was published to wide acclaim by Penguin U.K. Four more novels followed, and collections of short fiction and poetry. The Conductor was the highest-selling adult fiction title in New Zealand in 2011, staying at No. 1 for twenty weeks, and was subsequently widely translated. It was shortlisted for the Prix Femina. Quigley's magazine articles on divorce, dating, and love have garnered numerous accolades. She lives in Berlin.