A Change of Mind

By Tony Whelpton

Tony Whelpton published A Change of Mind in 2017, and it was launched at the 2017 Cheltenham Literature Festival, where Tony introduced it to a large audience.
A Change of Mind is the story of the struggle of Maurice Summerfield, an elderly Englishman, against a serious speech defect which only begins to afflict him once he reaches his eighties and for which there appears to be no physical or neurological cause. Maurice’s problems are especially distressing for him because of his earlier career, which embraced both academia, politics and broadcasting.
At the beginning of the novel Maurice appears to be in a very curious mental state, in which he is convinced that he is going backwards in his life, whereas everyone else appears to be going forward; in other words he is getting younger whilst everybody else is growing older. His wife Elaine, much distressed by what has befallen her husband, conspires with their daughter and a number of Maurice’s friends in establishing a plan to build up his confidence anew, having become convinced that, in the absence of physical or neurological causes, a crisis of confidence must be the only remaining reason for his having been reduced – at times, at any rate – to being a gibbering wreck. A series of fascinating episodes ensue, each of which involves Maurice being reunited with someone from his past, but it is almost by accident that Elaine stumbles across what appears to be the key to his problems: his relationship with his younger brother, who has spent most of his life as a drunken, violent criminal, with whom she engineers a reconciliation which enables her husband to find peace of mind at last.
The octogenarian author Tony Whelpton had a very good reason to write this story, because he has been through a very similar set of experiences to Maurice Summerfield and has spent a number of years attempting to answer the same questions as his protagonist. And did he find adequate answers? Not entirely, because there appears to be nobody who is really capable of finding the answers. But Tony has managed to construct an enthralling and engaging story out of his struggle.