The Father I Had - Hardcover

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Martin Townsend has been a journalist since 1979. He worked at Today newspaper and, at 25, became the youngest regular columnist in national newspapers. He joined You magazine at the Mail On Sunday as showbusiness editor. In 1996 he was head-hunted to join the staff of celebrity weekly OK! becoming editor in 1998. He has been editor of the Sunday Express since 2001 and is author of a highly-popular weekly column,A Word From The Editor. Martin is married with three children and lives in West London. The Father I Had is his first book.

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Father and son: arguably the most complex of all family relationships. But what happens when your dad is a manic-depressive who paints the front door in the middle of the night and sends well-wishes to Michael Crawford scrawled on a pair of underpants ?

Martin Townsend grew up with a father, Ron, who had suffered recurring mental illness since the early 1950s. At the slightest emotional trigger he could turn from a loving and compassionate dad - adored by his family and friends - to a restless, dead-eyed depressive or a spiteful, bullying monster. One moment he could be building his sons a play-house, the next terrorizing the family and smashing up the council house he had struggled so hard to get. Martin recounts his mother Peggy's courageous struggle to keep her family together in the face of bitter provocation and his father's battles with his own parents, torn between love for their son and their inability to face up to the reality of his illness.

In The Father I Had, Martin Townsend paints a powerful, often painful portrait of life with his dad. He describes the roller-coaster route of an illness that is still widely misunderstood but which touches the lives of millions of people. From the soaring, often hilarious 'highs' to the horrific 'lows' of his father's three suicide attempts, he tells a story of pain, courage and resilience. He remembers a father he loved unconditionally - but who would turn on him, as the eldest son, whenever the illness took hold. The Father I Had is amoving and marvellously written account of a close family nearly torn apart by mental illness, and a thoughtful reflection on that most sensitive of relationships - that between a father and a son.