Meg Mason’s novel about a sad, divorcing festival worker asks: can books save your life?

Eyupcan Timur/Pexels I sometimes say that My Family and Other Animals – Gerald Durrell’s autobiographical novel from 1956 – saved my life. My mother pressed her dog-eared copy into my hands during a year I was hospitalised repeatedly for major depression. The sun-soaked Greek island of Corfu — as well as the Durrell family’s foibles and adventures – felt a world away from my hometown’s bleak winter and all those blister packets and doctors’ waiting rooms. I became fascinated by Durrell’s…