In 1971 Laura and Guy Waterman decided to give up all the conveniences of life and homestead—living on the land in a cabin in the mountains of Vermont. For nearly three decades they ate food they grew themselves, and used no running water or electricity. It was an extreme that most of us can only imagine sustaining for a week or two. The end of their marriage came on February 6, 2000 when Guy climbed to the summit of Mount Lafayette in New Hampshire’s White Mountains and sat down among the rocks to die. Losing the Garden is the memoir of a woman who was compelled to ask herself "How could I stand by and watch my husband commit suicide?" It is an intimate examination of intricate and dark family histories and of a marriage that tried to transcend them. Laura’s father was a pre-eminent scholar whose brilliance was muddied by alcoholism. Guy Waterman lost two of his sons. In Losing the Garden, Laura Waterman comes to terms with her husband’s depression and his complex nature. Her account of her marriage, seen as idyllic, but riddled from within, is nonetheless a love story, and an affirmation of life after loss.