Dear Nobody: The True Diary of Mary Rose by Gillian McCain & Legs McNeil

It's really hard to critic the diary of a girl who has died, but that's what I have to do in order to review Dear Nobody: The True Diary of Mary Rose by Gillian McCain & Legs McNeil. Dear Nobody is the story of Mary Rose, collected from her diaries (although the entries are not dated, nor is the book all of her writing). Mary Rose is a teenage girl with drug and alcohol addictions, as well as cystic fibrosis. Her home life includes a neglectful mother who often has an abusive boyfriend. Basically, things are so horrible, it would be hard to believe if it wasn't the truth.

This is a real story, and Mary Rose isn't perfect either. She claims to love somebody, but often treats them horribly. She treats herself horribly. Awful things happen to her, but she also does awful things, and that's what makes it feel so real. This isn't a happy story, from the beginning, from the back of the book, that is immediately clear. This is the sort of storyline that would not be out of place in an Ellen Hopkins novel, but even without that thread of hope her stories usually provide.

As heartbreaking as Dear Nobody is, there were still a few things that bothered me about the book. Mary Rose writes a bunch of letters to another character that isn't really included in the book, so it's unclear who she really is and if she wrote back or not. Mary Rose is spilling her guts to her, and I know this is her story, but some context would have been useful. Also, likely because this is a diary, it was confusing and unclear at times, and despite being revealed absolutely everywhere I have read about this book, cystic fibrosis is seem as some kind of secret, which I found to be confusing. Dear Nobody is an unedited diary, and while that sometimes means it is confusing, ultimately it is also what makes it so heartbreaking and real.

Release Date: April 1st 2014 Pages: 330  Format: ARC
Source: Publisher  Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire  Buy It: Book Depository

Oranges are Not the Only Fruit & Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson

At the end of 2013/beginning of 2014 I read two books by Jeanette Winterson that I have decided to review together since I waited so long to share either of them. And because they are connected in a strange, but undeniable way. While Oranges are Not the Only Fruit is Winterson's first novel, it draws heavily from her own life, and the unfictionalized account is told in her memoir, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? published nearly two decades later. It was actually the memoir I was planning to read first, but as soon as I began it, the many references to Oranges meant that I had to stop, put it down, and return after having read the novel first.

Winterson's life, and the story she tells in both books, is something I can barely imagine. A girl adopted by very religious parents (especially the mother) only to do the unthinkable, fall in love with another girl. Despite all her struggles, there is a glimmer of hope to the Jeanette (also the name of the main character in Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit) that Winterson later admits in Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? wasn't real. An entire character, invented. The light in the darkness, false. It is was absolutely heartbreaking to read. In an unexpected twist, the novel tones down the things that nobody would believe-- except there they are, revealed in the memoir as the truth.

Both books, like everything I've read from Winterson, are quite short and only around 200 pages. There are so many sharp passages and moments are beautiful clarity in her phrasing, so many absolutely breath-taking passages. There are also a few moments in Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit that are weighed down by angst, and they do exist in the memoir as well, but I also feel like the distance offered by the additional years provides a bit of clarity to what has happened. As classic as Winterson's novel is, and as well as it wraps things up in a way that only fiction can, I think I prefer the honesty and truth of Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? a book that broke my heart in a way that only an emotionally raw and revealing story--a life lived-- can.

Release Date: January 1st 1985 / March 6th 2012 Pages: 192 / 230  Format: Hardcover
Source: Personal / Publisher  Buy It: Book Depository / Book Depository

Meghan Review: An Extraordinary Theory of Objects: A Memoir of an Outsider in Paris by: Stephanie LaCava

This unique memoir goes chronologically through Stephanie LaCava's childhood in Paris by moving, in a scrapbook-like fashion, through different objects she loved. As a young American girl, feeling awkward and out-of-place, LaCava found comfort in the unique objects she discovered while living abroad. She uses these objects as a method for coping with her increased anxiety and depression, and ultimately discovers that by using creativity to find the wonder in these items, she is also able to find wonder in a uncertain future.

This is definitely the most unique memoir I've ever read, full of illustrations of LaCava's found objects. At first, I though LaCava had done the illustrating herself, but small print on the title page explains that illustrations were done by Matthew Nelson. They are intricate and artistic, often suggesting the feel of an object, rather than just an accurate, more clinical drawing.

In addition to these illustrations, LaCava included copious historical footnotes about each object. Designated by an asterisk, these footnotes expand on the background of each object. From the origination of mummy powder to the short biographical notes about people such as the decorator Madeleine Castaing, these notes were by far my favorite part of the memoir. Quirky, interesting, and appropriately brief, they really worked to enrich my understanding of the significance each object had to LaCava. Though the footnote format may be distracting to some initially, I encourage readers to persevere! Similar to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by: Mark Haddox or House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, the footnotes are as much a part of the story as the text itself!

Though I would have liked to have a longer memoir from LaCava, with more details on her life and relationships, this collection (almost like a collection of short stories) stands strong on its own, flaunting its unique, ephemeral style.

Recommended to: people who want a little Parisian flair, fans of graphic novels or comics, history buffs, anyone who needs a quick and read on a flight to somewhere new.


Release Date: December 4, 2012  Pages: 224 Format: Hardcover
Source: TLC Book Tours Publisher: Harper Buy It: Book Depository

This is a review by Meghan. You can find her here on Goodreads or on Twitter @meghanc303

Meghan Review: And Now We Shall Do Manly Things by Craig J. Heimbuch

And Now We Shall Do Manly Things by Craig J. Heimbuch is a funny, quirky, and often extremely touching memoir of one man’s attempt to “discover his manhood through the great (and not-so-great) American hunt.” Heimbuch, as both author and narrator, imbibes his story with hilarious childhood anecdotes and reflections on his youth in the Midwest. He excels at creating character in just a few sentences, and he makes every person—whether it is his dear old dad or the man selling coffee at the gas station—unique and believable.

One of Heimbuch’s largest strengths is this ability to poke fun at humanity, without ever actually demeaning the people involved. His writing is a commentary on the whole human race, the hunting tradition, and his own nature, which makes it so much more funny and relatable. One of my favorite parts of the memoir was when Heimbuch discussed his affinity for the situationally appropriate “gear,” and reflects on his ill-fated attempt to introduce nylon parachute pants as a fashion statement back in school.

Much like Bill Bryson in style, Heimbuch managed to keep me (an ignorant non-hunter through and through!) engaged throughout the memoir. Though appropriately peppered with hunting jargon and terms I still don’t quite know if I grasp, the memoir maintained its firm perspective of another ignorant inductee to the hunting world, which really helped me from getting lost. Heimbuch also excels at sweeping reflections of the nature all around him. My current home is the Midwest, so I was especially able to appreciate his characterization of the landscape and his attention to place and environment.

Recommended to: the hunting enthusiast, the lover/sibling/friend/parent of the hunting enthusiast, Bill Bryson fans, and anyone who used to imagine being Daniel Boone when they were kids.

Release Date: October 30th 2012  Pages: 336  Format: ARC
Source: TLC Book Tours  Publisher: Harper Collins  Buy It: Book Depository

This is a review by Meghan. You can find her here on Goodreads or on Twitter @meghanc303

The Guardians: An Elegy by Sarah Manguso

The Guardians: An Elegy by Sarah Manguso
 
Release Date: February 28th 2012
Pages: 128
Format: Hardcover
Source: Publisher
Publisher:  Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Also by this Author: The Two Kinds of Decay
Buy It: Book Depository

The Guardians is an elegy for Manguso’s friend Harris, two years after he escaped from a psychiatric hospital and jumped under that train. The narrative contemplates with unrelenting clarity their crowded postcollege apartment, Manguso’s fellowship year in Rome, Harris’s death and the year that followed—the year of mourning and the year of Manguso’s marriage.

So the first thing I want to talk about is what I was afraid of when I first picked up The Guardians; and that was that it might get bogged down in science instead of lifted up by poetry, something Manguso's first memoir The Two Kinds of Decay suffered from a bit too much. And unfortunately it does, sometimes veering into too much fact, like describing side effects of certain anti-psychotics, going into a detailed history of akathisia, even quoting two paragraphs directly from a Czech doctor, Ladislav Haskovec. At the end of the description she links it back to her friend Harris, as the common outcome includes suicide, specifically by jumping, but by that point I was wondering why I was reading all of this info dump of facts.

The other major time info-dump happened was much later in the book, where there are several pages quoting three published cases on the same side effect. The Guardians is so short, barely past 100 pages, so that in a way I felt cheated having to read three full pages that weren't Manguso's; more science, more quotes. She even quotes herself at one point, a page from a novel she didn't finish.

But– the reason I felt the need to detail the fault of this memoir so precisely is that the rest of The Guardians, the part in Manguso's own words, it's absolutely breath-taking and original. There are countless times when I had to pause reading to write down a quote, something beautiful and heart-breaking that twisted inside me. At one point, Manguso writes:

"Then, when he dies, you’ll wonder how his death could have burned you entirely away– yet there you are, walking out of the fire in a form you no longer recognize."

Her powerful description of grief reminded me sometimes of The Long Goodbye by Meghan O'Rourke, another memoir and one I absolutely adored. Both O'Rourke and Manguso have this powerful, sharp and broken way of describing grief, of reminding the reader of the pain. The other author that comes to mind, because of the topic but also the fragmented way of writing, different memories combining into one tragic story– is Joan Didion, who dealt with grief in two memoirs, The Year of Magical Thinking and Blue Nights. It especially reminds me of Blue Nights because it is both the story of the person who died, in this case her friend Harris, and a story of a personal journey– as Manguso marries her husband.

Ultimately, Manguso's poetic prose is what make The Guardians such a wonderful yet heart-breaking book– she has a genuine and beautiful way of capturing moments and feelings, which is why I am disappointed every time she veers off into the scientific instead.

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Release Date: November 1st 2011
Pages: 208
Format: Hardcover
Source: Publisher
Publisher: Random House Canada
Also by this Author: The Year of Magical Thinking
Buy It: Book Depository

Reflecting on her daughter but also on her role as a parent, Didion asks the candid questions any parent might about how she feels she failed either because cues were not taken or perhaps displaced. "How could I have missed what was clearly there to be seen?" Finally, perhaps we all remain unknown to each other. Seamlessly woven in are incidents Didion sees as underscoring her own age, something she finds hard to acknowledge, much less accept.

I'd read at least one Joan Didion novel in the past (Play It As It Lays– there may have been others but I can't remember them offhand) but my most recent by her was a memoir, The Year of Magical Thinking which is about her husband's unexpected death and was, as expected, both beautiful written and incredibly depressing. So when I learned that her next book was another memoir, this time about her daughter's death (her daughter had been very ill in Magical Thinking), I was pretty conflicted. Of course I was going to read it, but I had to wait for the right mindset. Even after my friend Laala told me it wasn't nearly as depressing as her previous book... well I was still skeptical.

So that's why it took me about six months to finally read Blue Nights, but when I finally did I was incredibly surprised. As much as there are sad moments and many deaths in this memoir, what it really is, is a celebration of life. Didion's daughter, Quintana, once told her, on death "don't dwell on it", and that seems to be exactly what she's tried to do in Blue Nights. Instead, Didion reflects on some of the important moments in Quintana's life: her wedding, what it was like to adopt her, some memorable childhood memories. 

What definitely comes through in the pages of Blue Nights is the love Didion continues to have for her only child, but that is expected. What is more interesting, and complex, is her reflections on whether she was a good parent, whether she did everything she could. I think every parent must worry about those same things, and Didion examines them with a honest and eloquent voice. There is a lot of repetition in this book, and sometimes it felt like too much; the same memory told again when I was hoping for something fresh. At the same time, I wonder if that's because of Didion's grief, that obsessive way that you go over some specific moments when you loose a person; I could understand that, but still feel like she had a whole lifetime with her daughter to draw from, and I wish there had been a little bit more of it shared. 

Intertwined with Quintana's story is Didion's own reflections on aging and mortality, her own examination of herself, which was also really interesting to read about. I'm still in my early twenties, and so it is hard to imagine myself fifty years from now. There are some really powerful segments where she talks about the differences between how she continues to see herself, and how she really is. Didion writes: 

"A doctor to whom I occasionally talk suggests that I have made an inadequate adjustment to aging.
Wrong, I want to say.
In fact I have made no adjustment whatsoever to aging.
In fact I had lived my entire life to date without seriously believing that I would age.
I had no doubt that I would continue to wear the red suede sandals with four-inch heels that I had always preferred."

Blue Nights manages to celebrate and examine, rather than fall into the dark pit of tragedy, and though I wished for less repetition, what I found among it all was a beautifully written memoir that combines Didion's own story with that of her daughter in a unique and incredibly moving book. 

Eating Dirt by Charlotte Gill

Eating Dirt by Charlotte Gill

Release Date: September 2nd 2011
Pages: 272
Format: Hardcover
Source: Publisher
Publisher: Greystone Books
Buy It: Book Depository

Gill offers up a slice of tree-planting life in all of its soggy, gritty exuberance while questioning the ability of conifer plantations to replace original forests, which evolved over millennia into intricate, complex ecosystems. Among other topics, she also touches on the boom-and-bust history of logging and the versatility of wood, from which we have devised countless creations as diverse as textiles and airplane parts.

As somebody who once got a job as a tree-planter, only to end up quitting before I even started when a parent got married the same summer I was supposed to work, I was especially intrigued in picking up this look into the life of a career tree-planter. Gill worked as a tree-planter for 20 years, and all I can say is: she should have been writing.

Well, maybe not, because then we wouldn't have gotten this incredible memoir, Eating Dirt. It's one of those books that manages to mix the personal and the factual in a smooth and interesting way. Gill covers all kinds of history: logging, tree-planting, agriculture, and other plant uses. Because of the non-fiction distractions, the chronology of Eating Dirt can be a bit confusing at times– I'm not sure, but I think that the ending took place before another chunk of the book. It probably wasn't helped by the fact that I took a three month break while reading the memoir though. I'm so glad I went back to Eating Dirt when I was ready for it, instead of swamped with school work, because it's really a poetic and amazingly written book.

Gill has some funny anecdotes, some emotional ones, and even some scary ones (Mama Bear anyone?). It makes Eating Dirt a great mix of stories, held together by her clear love for tree-planting. It's hard to imagine somebody doing this voluntarily, and the memoir is filled with an eclectic cast of people who do. I love the way the tree planters are mostly called "we" throughout the book, because it just makes it clear what a strong connection this kind of experience forms. Assuming that Gill has retired from tree-planting, I wish there had been a little insight into what it was like for her afterwards, but given that the book follows only one year, that probably would have required an epilogue.

I'm not sure I can recommend this book if you are considering planting trees. On one hand, it's a vivid insight into the job. On the other hand, I'm now one hundred percent glad I missed out on the opportunity to do. Eating Dirt exposes what life is like planting trees, peels away the bark to the soft underbelly, and the result is a beautiful and brutal exploration of a unique career and the people who choose it.

Holy Ghost Girl by Donna Johnson

Holy Ghost Girl by Donna Johnson is a memoir so unbelievable, that if it wasn't non-fiction I don't know if I would have believed it was true. Johnson was only three years old when her mother joined brother David Terrell and his Evangelical tent revivalist movement, a group that tours from city to city preaching in large tents similar to a circus. The circus comparison is apt considering a lot of went on under and surrounding the tent was just as hectic- healings and secret children and cults- and Johnson's family was all part of its inner circle of faith and deception.

Holy Ghost Girl takes place over the sixties and seventies, and Johnson does a pretty good job of telling the story considering she was a kid for most of it. As extravagant and insane as the life of David Terrell is (he's still preaching these days), what I found most interesting was what life was like for Johnson herself. Her own story is the one she is most qualified to tell, and at times I felt she got bogged down by events she couldn't remember or wasn't there for. I appreciate filling in the gaps, but at the same time it left holes where I wanted to know more- mainly how her experiences and very unusual childhood impacted her life later on, a topic that was skimmed over at times. Johnson's writing is clear and easy to read but I often felt an emotional detachment from the story, despite being interested in the premise.

Ultimately, Holy Ghost Girl provides a riveting look into a culture that will be completely unfamiliar to most, and although it wasn't a perfect fit for me as a reader, it certainly has a lot to offer on a controversial and unique topic.     

Release Date: October 13th 2011
Pages: 288
Buy the Book
Source:

This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Addicted: Notes from the Belly of the Beast edited by Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane

Addicted: Notes from the Belly of the Beast edited by Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane

Release Date: September 1st, 2001
Pages: 192
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Greystone Books
Source: Library
Buy It: Book Depository
Also By Author: Small Mechanics (Lorna Crozier)

Addicted is an anthology of personal essays devoted to a subject close--often way too close--to the hearts of the writers involved. That is their addictions, be it to booze, cigarettes, heroin, or self-destruction in general.

Although I was drawn to Addicted because of how much I loved Lorna Crozier's poetry collection Small Mechanics, each of the ten authors in this collection of essays completely blew me away.  With the exception of Crozier, whose father and husband were alcoholics, each writer is struggling with a life-consuming, and potentially life-ending, addiction. The majority of the collection- seven of the ten essays- focuses on alcoholism, with six of the writers being recovered alcoholics themselves, for as Crozier writes, in our culture alcohol "remains the common drug of choice. It is, after all, legal and easy to get." 

Addicted also asks some interesting questions about the connection between addiction and creativity, as well as offering a heartfelt warning to the next generation of writers who may be tempted to rely on substance abuse for inspiration. The writers in this collection are powerfully open and honest, they share not only their stories, but also their names. Many of them talk about the role family history played in their addictions, in "My Father, Myself" Marnie Woodrow writes "My father drank too much and, for a time, so did I. Something made him continue to drink; something made me pause halfway along the path." Perhaps by sharing their stories these authors have made somebody else pause on the downward spiral into the darkness.

For me, the standout of Addicted was definitely "Junkie" where Stephen Reid discusses his heroin addiction, one that began when a pedophile first injected him with morphine, seducing him.  Interestingly, Reid is the husband of Canadian poet Susan Musgrave and he appears quite often in her recent collection, Origami Dove. However, he is also a famed bank robber (he's currently in prison, as a documentary I saw informed me) as well as an author in his own right. His story, "Junkie" is incredibly smart and funny and absolutely heart-breaking. Writing about the man who took his innocence, Reid says "It is not what Paul took from me, it is what I kept: the lie that the key to the gates to paradise was a filled syringe." Later, in a statement which could apply to any addiction, he adds: "There is a Zen-like irony in the junkie slang "to fix." A shot of heroin doesn't fix anything: heroin only gives shelter to that which is broken."

As Patrick Lane writes in the afterword regarding addicts: "Some of us will make it, some of us won't, but we sing our heats out anyway. We sing as hard as we can." Addicted is a strong and complex voice singing the stories of addicts loud and clear. It is completely honest and completely memorable, as well as a must-read for young writers everywhere.

Swing Low by Miriam Toews

Swing Low is the story of Miriam Toews' father, a man who suffered his whole life from bipolar disorder, keeping his struggles almost entirely to himself as he went against his psychiatrist's predictions that he wouldn't marry, start a family, or hold down a job. Instead, Mel Toews spent a forty years as a respected teacher, married his lifelong sweetheart, and had two happy and successful daughters. Then, after suffering a heart attack which limited the oxygen to his brain causing permanent damage, Mel was forced to retire from teaching, a job that had been as much an escape as a career. Finally, in 1998, he had himself released from the hospital and jumped in front of an incoming train.

With Swing Low Toews has written the story of the brilliant yet troubled man that her father was, how he would be outgoing and vibrant in the classroom only to remain in complete silence and despair at home. Bipolar disorder meant there were two sides to Mel, the manic and the depressive, and as Toews tries to come to terms with both her father's life and death, she attempts to bridge the gap in between the person her father was, and the person he tried so hard to be.

Like Half-Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls, Swing Low is more of a True Life Novel than a traditional memoir or biography. Written almost entirely in the first person from Mel's perspective- with the exception of a short introduction and epilogue- Toews truly lets the reader in on not only the experiences, but the emotions they provoked. I read this memoir after finishing Toews' latest novel, Irma Voth, and was shocked by the difference between the two. Although both take place in a Mennonite community, Swing Low is far more emotional and evocative, while Irma Voth tells a clearer and more distinct story. At first, and for many pages, I found myself very confused by the scattered narrative of Swing Low, the story begins with Mel in his hospital bed, slightly insane from dementia and trying to figure out what is going on. To do so, he goes back through his life, connecting the events that brought him to that moment together. As could be expected with a crazy narrator, sometimes he is quite difficult to follow and so it took a long time for me to get involved in the story. Even though Toews is taking on the voice of her father, it definitely felt genuine, and it's clear she didn't paint him in an idealistic light but instead Mel remains human and flawed. He was a man that tried very hard, but that didn't mean he was perfect.

Ultimately, I feel conflicted over this book. On one hand, it is a rich and inventive look into the mind of mental illness, especially in when it occurs in a not entirely understanding time or culture, which is both unique and believable. But at the same time, sometimes the book was too believable, in that I really felt like it was written by an insane person which made it difficult and not entirely enjoyable to read. Overall, Swing Low is a unique and insightful look into living with mental illness and although I found it confusing at times, it is a strong testament to Mel Toews and a reminder that no matter who we are, our parents remain a part of us.

Release Date: May 28th 2000
Pages: 240
Buy the Book
Source:

This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Don't Kill the Birthday Girl by Sandra Beasley

Don't Kill the Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life is a memoir by Sandra Beasley, who previously published two poetry collections, about living with severe and lifelong allergies that include: dairy, egg, soy, beef, shrimp, pine nuts, cucumbers, cantaloupe, honeydew, mango, macadamias, pistachios, cashews, swordfish, and mustard. Right from the introduction of her memoir Beasley writes "those with food allergies aren't victims. We're people who- for better or for worse- experience the world in a slightly different way. This is not a story of how we die. These are the stories of how we live." This positivity is consistent throughout the book in a way that was very refreshing. It would be easy for a person who has so much added burden in life to complain and whine about how difficult things are, but Don't Kill the Birthday Girl is not a call for pity, instead it is a look into what life is like with multiple fatal allergies, as well as the science and history behind the study of allergies.

Beasley does an expert job smoothly weaving personal anecdote with scientific study in an easy to read way resulting a book that merges memoir and non-fiction perfectly. It is actually a style of writing I encountered, awkwardly, earlier this year in Lonely by Emily White but in this case Beasley manages to make her science approachable to average reader. She also avoids listing an overwhelming number of statistics, which was greatly appreciated as when it comes to allergies there certainly are plenty, but it's not really what I am are looking for when I pick up recreational reading. What I loved so much about Don't Kill the Birthday Girl was that although I never felt like I was learning, I came away from the book both more knowledgeable and more compassionate about food allergies.

As somebody who has always suffered from many environmental allergies including pollen, dust, mold and basically every animal ever, there were many days going through boxes of tissues, with a bright red nose and itchy eyes and dosed up on antihistamines that left me drowsy- sometimes caused by nothing more than a nice spring day or sitting next to somebody with a cat- that I wished for a food allergy, something easy to avoid. After reading Don't Kill the Birthday Girl, in which a kiss on the cheek from somebody who just ate a cupcake leaves hives in a lip-shape across Beasley's cheek, a trip to the movies requires Benadryl because of nearby buttered popcorn, and a first date at a new restaurant can mean a trip to the hospital, that I truly understand how lucky I am.

As an individual with celiac disease, I was curious if the illness, though not an allergy but also an illness triggered by certain foods, would appear in Don't Kill the Birthday Girl. Although the focus was of course allergy, there were several mentions of celiac disease. The first paragraph in which it appears made me clench my jaw with concern for the rest of the book, as it says "in acute cases, the severity of the reaction demands zero tolerance for exposure" when in fact all cases of celiac disease require no gluten at all in the diet including such demons as cross-contamination. Luckily, despite preparing myself for ranting about its portrayal, gluten and celiac disease appears regularly alongside food allergies when Beasley is talking about dining out and social situations in the rest of the book. 

There are so many issues people with allergies face outside of just staying alive and Beasley enlightens the reader about them in a way that is light and clever, while still getting the facts across. Don't Kill the Birthday Girl tackles everything from food on an airplane to traveling internationally to dealing with weddings and birthdays. Beasley lets you in on what life was like growing up with so many allergies, especially before the main stream acceptance of them that has appeared more recently, and how she deals with accidental contamination, especially in social situations. She lets you know why so many allergic children hate using their epi-pens, and what it was like living in a collage dorm. Beasley ponders the longterm sacrifice that is required for shared living, both for her and any future spouse, as well as how she would raise her own children who may or may not have allergies, or may even have different allergies altogether. Throughout the course of Don't Kill the Birthday Girl it becomes clear that for those with life-threatening food allergies, it's not just a medical condition but a way of life- and although it may not be "normal" it is one Beasley lives with pride and exuberance, taking it one day of carefully prepared food at a time.

Release Date: July 12th 2011
Pages: 240
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Source: Publisher

I Wore the Ocean in the Shape of a Girl by Kelle Groom

I Wore the Ocean in the Shape of a Girl is a memoir by poet Kelle Groom about the death of her son at only a year old, whom she had as a teenager and gave up for adoption to an aunt and uncle, and how his death as well as her ever-present alcoholism impacted her life for the subsequent two decades.

Groom's writing is undeniably beautiful, but her story is not told chronologically and quite a few times I found myself confused, unsure of where she was living and what had happened. The writing style is already quite abstract and metaphoric, so I feel like a little more clarity when it came to the timeline of events would have helped with understanding it. Like History of a Suicide by Jill Bialosky,  I Wore the Ocean in the Shape of a Girl is clearly written by a poet in a way that is unique and engrossing. However, unlike Bialosky's examination of the science behind suicide, Groom's story is entirely personal and all the more heartbreaking because of the incredible pain she has suffered. In fact, so many tragic things happen to Groom that if this wasn't a memoir, it wouldn't make believable fiction, from drinking to rape to death, this is certainly not an uplifting story.

Particularly beautiful, as well as painful, are Groom's writings on what life was growing up, on how alcohol changed her, and the things she experienced as a young woman. Perhaps it is my own age that made it difficult to connect with some of her experiences as she reached middle-age, but it seems more that with the passing of time Groom is able to capture her past with a blurred, yet sharp, lens that recent events do not allow for. She is general with the details and yet specific with her metaphors. At one point she writes:

"I could be made of felt, cut into the shape of a woman- I keep arranging an expression on my face that is the opposite of crying."

Making the reader wish so desperately they could reach through the page and comfort her with a hug. In writing about alcoholism, Groom not only offers a cautionary warning about the downward spiral it presents, but also helps the reader understand the incredibly seductive and addictive nature of the beast. Ultimately though, I Wore the Ocean in the Shape of a Girl is a tale of redemption, and for every person like Groom who overcomes immense suffering, there are those that shatter in the face of such pain and although I found her story confusing at times it manages to bring hope to a situation which may seem irrevocably bleak.

Release Date: June 7th  2011
Pages: 256
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Source: Simon and Schuster Galley Grab

The Rules of the Tunnel by Ned Zeman

The Rules of the Tunnel: A Brief Period of Madness is a memoir by Ned Zeman, a journalist for Vanity Fair who profiled various troubled celebrities until one day he became victim of the same madness that had plagued so many of them. Intertwined with biographical insight into the lives of the people Zeman wrote about is his own personal account of his illness and how it impacted his relationships, work and friendships. In the second half the memoir Zeman attempts to reconstruct what happened during the two years of his life he can't remember, two years of memories stolen as a side effect of electroconvulsive therapy, and having made it to the other side of the tunnel he does so with intelligence and a dark sense of humor about his experiences.

I'm pretty much on the fence about The Rules of the Tunnel, in some ways it is unconventional- even considering it's a memoir about mental illness- and yet in other ways I found it slightly infuriating. Zeman even admits that the electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) has left him worse off than he was before and while he is still writing in support of the practice, there still seems to be a good reason that it is only used in extreme cases. In Zeman's case he seemed to search purposefully for a therapist that would give him the answer he wanted, whether that be a cocktail of drugs or an electrical charge to his brain. As a journalist, Zeman is used to investigating, and after reading and writing about so many other people; famous, creative, people; who underwent the treatment it seems like he treated it more as if it were an experiment, or a fun way to spend a Wednesday, than with the seriousness it deserved. He also, as he admits in the book, didn't really take full of advantage of the other options available to those with mental illness, mainly drugs and therapy, and instead seemed interested in a quick fix. I'm not saying he wasn't depressed, he clearly was, but he seemed to take pride in outsmarting his therapists in a way that was pretty disturbing. A positive consequence of his memoir is that I am certain nobody who reads it will take ECT as lightly as he did.

Another issue I had with the conclusion of the book involved a breakup that happened during Zeman's illness and which he attributed to his madness, before recognizing that the couple were ill-fated either way. Although the reader knows from the beginning that the couple will break up, considering he just spent an entire book talking about how great the woman was, I was left pretty puzzled by his final assessment about their long-term possibility and I feel that if he was going to say that, he should have backed it up at some point in the book.

One of the unique aspects of The Rules of the Tunnel is that Zeman wrote it in second person singular (ie: You wake up in the morning) a style I've rarely seen in literature, although the book that stands out most in my mind is Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney. In this case, the technique seems to be used to truly make the reader feel as if they are experiencing the horror, and yet sometimes unintended benefits, of amnesia. I think it also helps show how mental illness can impact anyone. That said, I didn't particularly enjoy the style.

Although my discussion of the memoir has been fairly critical, I think that helps to show some of the controversial issues the book brings up. However, what left me mostly on the fence about the book is the second half in which Zeman is open, honest, and raw about how these experiences changed him. His loss of memory was unusual, but extremely scary and I certainly recommend the book to anyone interested in knowing more about ECT, especially from the perspective of somebody who has experienced a severe side of it. It is impossible to view what madness is like from the outside, and with  The Rules of the Tunnel Zeman adds to the reader's understanding of how the brain works, and what happens when it doesn't quite function as intended.

Release Date: August 4th, 2011
Pages: 288
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Breaking Up With God by Sarah Sentilles

Breaking Up With God by Sarah Sentilles begins with probably the most interesting prologue I've read, setting the stage for the story of one woman's loss of faith and how it changed her life and her perspective on the world. The memoir begins:

"I broke up with God. The breakup was devastating. It was like a divorce when all the friends you had as a couple are forced to choose sides and end up not choosing yours. It was like waking up in an empty bed in an empty house. It was like someone I loved died."

Sentilles' was on her way to becoming an Episcopal priest, she was a doctoral student in theology, when she realized that the God she was in a relationship with contradicted everything she believed. When she left God, it changed her whole life, she had find new friends, a new career, figure out what life meant to her without God in it. The relationship analogy referred to in the title is maintained throughout the memoir, and I found it to be a very interesting way of looking at things. Sentilles' writing is lovely and there are moments in the book that made me catch my breath. At one point, she writes:

"In that moment between knowing the relationship must end and doubting you will ever find someone else, you have to believe you are enough. You have to be willing to stand in that empty house and love yourself.
Ending things requires faith."

In Breaking Up With God Sentilles realizes that her whole life her belief in God was something she felt like she was obligated to have, an arranged marriage of sorts, and when she finally thought about what she truly wanted it was something very different. However, as much as I fell in love with the memoir from the first page, there are aspects I struggled with. Throughout Breaking Up With God there are these tiny little essays, and I never really understood the point of them or why they were written in a childlike voice. Also, as much as I enjoyed reading about Sentilles' journey, I realized when I came to the end of the book I wasn't even sure that she really had ended her relationship with God, as parts of the story are a bit unclear and often it seemed like it was the Church, not God, that she had her issues with and obviously a Christian perspective of God isn't the only one that exists. My biggest problem with the book however, comes with the ending. Suddenly Breaking Up With God switches from the story of a spiritual journey to a manifesto about eating local and vegetarian, with scary facts and descriptions about the meat industry. Honestly, I'm still not sure what that portion of the book was doing there, but maybe I am missing something.

What I loved most about Breaking Up With God was Sentilles' writing, it is creative and imaginative and she looks at God in a way the reader may not agree with, but will definitely make you think. Although this memoir is flawed, it is also unlike anything else I have ever read and that is reason enough to make me glad that I picked it up.

Release Date: June 7th, 2011
Pages: 256
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Thoughts Without Cigarettes by Oscar Hijuelos

Thoughts Without Cigarettes is a memoir by Oscar Hijuelos, a man who was the first Hispanic author to win the Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love. Although I have not read any of Hijuelos books yet, this is a memoir which although probably more enlightening (especially towards the end) for readers of Hijuelos, has much to offer even for those unfamiliar with his work.

Hijuelos' writing is lovely, he certainly paints a vivid picture with his words. And the original premise, a young boy growing up in New York City, the son of immigrant parents, feelings of lost culture and lack of belonging because his skin was so light, all of this interested me. However when it came to the actual memoir, Thoughts Without Cigarettes was a slow read that often had difficulty keeping my attention. The book is extremely full of references to famous people and Hijuelos' interactions with them and it often comes across as name-dropping and not at all crucial to the story he is telling. For example, he writes about how he sat near Allen Ginsberg who congratulated him on a talk only not to recognize him later in the evening. Throughout Thoughts Without Cigarettes, Hijuelos also gives his opinion on various other writers. At times I thought he was overly harsh about calling other writers dull, since this isn't a work of literary criticism and he doesn't particularly back up his statements it came across as a bit petty at times- especially when he does it in reference to an author who won an award Hijuelos was also nominated for, for example.

The most interesting parts of Thoughts Without Cigarettes involved Hijuelos' childhood, what it was like to come back home after a serious illness and a year in the hospital, having 'lost' his Spanish in the meantime, only to be treated as a fragile child, unable to play outside and eat candy like the other boys. Hijuelos also discusses what it was like to be pigeon-holed as an "immigrant" writer, and offers a strong reminder that we still have a long way to go when it comes to achieving equal amounts of publicity regardless of race. I couldn't help but be reminded of earlier this year when Jennifer Egan beat Jonathan Franzen for the National Book Award, only to have a large picture of Franzen featured in the LA Times instead, as well as Franzen's book title mentioned in the headline but Egan's only referred to as her "work". Hijuelos contemplates if perhaps his ability to break out as a Latino writer stems from the fact that he does not look stereotypically Latino. The memoir includes some very thought-provoking and interesting discussions on race and the literary world.

There is quite a bit of Thoughts Without Cigarettes which I think would be more interesting if I had previously read Hijuelos' first two novels, as he discusses what it was like to publish them and how he came to write them. Regardless, he has an enjoyable style of writing that I think I would actually prefer in a novel, because what I disliked about the memoir was the name-dropping and slow pace, things that would easily be solved in the case of a plot and a fictional narration. Overall, Thoughts Without Cigarettes offers insight into the mind and life of a famous author, while also pondering some profound inequalities that continue to exist, although it was a slow book for me to read I am glad for the introduction to Oscar Hijuelos and I look forward to picking up one of his novels in the future.
 
Release Date: June 2nd, 2011
Pages: 384
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

The Council of Dads by Bruce Feiler

The Council of Dads by Bruce Feiler is the heartbreaking and powerful true story of what happens when a father of two young girls is diagnosed with an extremely aggressive and life-threatening cancer. Bruce Feiler was only in his forties when he learned he had bone cancer, and he was instantly concerned about what life would be like for her his twin girls if he was no longer in their life. Within a few days he had come up with the concept of a Council of Dads, a group of men who were not biologically related to him but rather friends that represented different facets of himself and would be able to give his daughters advice and let them in on what their dad would have thought.

Feiler is the author of several acclaimed non-fiction books but with The Council of Dads he lets the reader into his own life and what an extremely difficult year in his life was like. The memoir intertwines with a lesson and short biography of each of the six dads on Feiler's council, as well as letters he sent to family and friends about his illness, and of course some of his own advice for his daughters.

Instantly upon reading the synopsis of The Council of Dads I knew it would be a sad book, but because of Feiler's skilled writing it is so much more than that. It makes you laugh and smile and it warms your heart. It's a powerful testament to the strength that people can find in impossible situations, and the bravery of an ordinary man. The Council of Dads is an emotional and moving story which sticks with the reader, reminding them of the value of each day. Unlike Two Kisses for Maddy by Matthew Logelin which I read recently and is also about a man's relationship with his daughter in tragic circumstances, the reader is able to maintain a sense of optimism throughout The Council of Dads because we know that Feiler comes out okay and that is how he is able to write the memoir in the first place. I think that Feiler's positive attitude throughout his experiences, even though he is realistic about his chances of surviving, means that despite its serious subject matter this is not a bleak book.

An interesting aspect of The Council of Dads that I didn't expect is the insight into the uniqueness of male friendships, and how important good friends are. There is so much talk in the world about deadbeat dads, it is definitely a nice change to read a book written by a man who is clearly a loving and caring father and is more concerned than anything about the impact his absence would have on his daughters. With Father's Day approaching, I could not think of a better book to recommend than The Council of Dads.

Release Date: April 27th, 2010
Pages: 256
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Two Kisses for Maddy by Matthew Logelin

Two Kisses for Maddy: A Memoir of Loss & Love by Matthew Logelin is an incredibly tragic, unfortunately true story. Matt and Liz were highschool sweethearts, and after being together for over ten years their lives seem right on track: they've married, bought their dream home, and have a little girl on the way. Then all of that falls apart when Liz delivers premature but healthy baby Madeline and dies twenty four hours later without ever holding her daughter. Matt is not only grief-stricken but now facing parenthood alone, but he manages to find hope for the future in his beautiful baby girl and through his experiences reaches out to others like him.

Two Kisses for Maddy is an unbelievably sad story, and yet the message that the reader comes away with is not one of sadness but one of hope- this is Logelin's greatest accomplishment. Even with all the pain he has gone through, he finds inspiration in his love for his daughter. As a memoir, the writing is very casual and familiar, it almost feels as if Logelin is telling this story to a friend, which makes its contents even more heartbreaking. He doesn't hide things that others would have been hesitant to share, for example the fact that Liz was highly concerned that her child would be ugly and while Matt was visiting her in the NICU needed confirmation that she was in fact beautiful. Although these tidbits of information don't necessarily make the reader like Liz, they certainly make her human and real. The fact that these are real people, not characters in a book, mean that they are human and flawed, but they also love deeply and irrevocably and when Maddy someday reads her father's memoir it will be impossible to doubt the love that Matt and Liz had not only for each other, but for her before she was even born.

That said, an aspect of Two Kisses for Maddy that disappointed me was the fact that despite being published three years after Liz's death, it only covers what the first year was like for Logelin. Although I appreciate that the first year was the most difficult, I did think an epilogue of some sort which let the reader know a little bit about the subsequent two years would have been nice. Logelin also implies that he will never date again and although this is romantic, it seems perhaps overly sentimental but maybe if he had elaborated further it would have been more understandable, I can only hypothesize that because this was a book written mainly with his daughter in mind that wanted to keep the focus on what parenting would be like.

As a memoir, Two Kisses for Maddy is both heartbreaking and excruciatingly honest. Logelin begins the books by admitting that he is not a writer, that he never planned to write a book, and without these tragic events in his life he probably never would have. That truthful statement is something I reminded myself of when I didn't find the writing itself particularly memorable. Logelin's particular style of writing isn't what is going to stick with the reader. What does stick with the reader is the incredibly tragic but beautiful story of love and loss that Logelin tells Two Kisses for Maddy, one that nobody ever wants to experience but which he managed to make the best of anyway.

Release Date: April 14th, 2011
Pages: 272
Source: Netgalley
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The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock

The Paper Garden: An Artist Begins Her Life's Work at 72 by Molly Peacock tells the story of Mary Granville Pendarves Delany, an English woman who lived from 1700-1788. Married to a sixty-one year-old man at sixteen, she was a widow by twenty-five and waited twenty years to finally remarry. After her second husband, who she loved, died she moved in with a close friend of hers and at the age of 72, picked up a pair of scissors and created a new art form. Creating almost one thousand botanically correct, cup-paper flowers, Mary Delany was the founder of collage. Intertwined with Peacock's biography of Mary is pieces of her own story and the connection she has found to the remarkable artist.

At first look, The Paper Garden was exactly my kind of book. I love memoirs, my mother is an artist, and I have spent most of my post-graduate education learning about plants. However when I picked up the book, something just didn't click with me as a reader. One problem was that some of the "scientific" statements bothered me, for example she says that "All flowers have both ovaries and semen-(a.k.a pollen-) forming organs.", which is completely incorrect, there are many flowers which are imperfect, meaning that that they contain only female or male reproductive organs, not both. This sort of statement is not something whose inaccuracy I wouldn't have recognized if I didn't have at least a rudimentary understanding of botany, but considering Peacock has written a non-fiction book where botany plays an important role I was disappointed to find incorrect science within it. I was reading an advanced copy of the book so perhaps it was changed in the final version, but finding even one false statement made me doubt the accuracy of the entire work in a way that I didn't enjoy.

At times I found the story-telling style simply too dramatic for me, for example at one point Peacock writes of Delany riding a horse on the beach that "the cantering four-legged beauty between her legs a vigorous inversion of the ineffective beast of a man at home." a line which feels more appropriate for a romance novel than a biography. In fact, The Paper Garden isn't a biography in the traditional sense of the word, and while at times this makes it wonderful and unique, there were also many times when as a scientifically-minded individual I was overwhelmed by Peacock's interpretations and wanted to shout, tell me the facts. Sometimes, the flowery language was simply too much (no pun intended).

It took me a lot longer than I expected to read The Paper Garden, and a lot of that had to do with the difficulty I had getting immersed in the story. The premise itself is really fascinating, and I was definitely intrigued to learn more about this fantastic woman who was a pioneer is so many ways, but Peacock's language and personally interpretations often lost me. Although there are many positive reviews of the book out there, ultimately the pace of the book was simply too slow for me. Overall, there was a lot that excited and enticed me into picking up The Paper Garden, but unfortunately there wasn't a lot that kept me reading.

Release Date: October 12th, 2010
Pages: 416
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.

Small Memories by José Saramago

Small Memories is a memoir of Nobel Prize Winner José Saramago's childhood in Portuguese villages. It shifts back and forth from when he was a young boy to a teenager, recounting his family and what it was like to grow up in an illiterate family where he began to teach himself. It is the story of how a man unexpectedly became a famous and incredible writer. However, admittedly, this is a strange choice for a first book to read by Saramego but that is the way it worked out. I had read half of his novel, Death With Interruptions, last year before it was due back to the library. Since Small Memories didn't have a due date I was actually able to have a complete introduction to Saramego.

That said, I don't think that Small Memories was the best introduction to Saramego. It is very anecdotal in nature, and readers familiar with his work will be interested to know that he elaborates on the inspiration behind many of them, for example the scary blind man that likely inspired him to write the book Blindness, but most of these references were lost on me. I also found many of the stories long-winded and that there were a lot of names mentioned so I sometimes became confused. Perhaps the memoir could have been more strongly edited as there is irrelevant and even boring information included that distracts from the storytelling, for example when Saramego says he took a test on the groundfloor of the building, then elaborating that in fact it was only the ground floor if you entered from the playground, but actually the first floor if you entered from the street. I feel like I have wasted your time even telling you this example as it is so pointless to the story and fairly random and out of place in the memoir as a whole.

Still, in addition to the interesting background information on Saramego, there is definitely a sense of humour in Small Memories. Saramego explains how his father was forced to name himself after his son, when a clerk gave Saramego the family nickname for his last name on his birth certificate, and so Saramego is not actually a family name at all. It is also very interesting to learn about what it was like growing up for Saramego, as his experiences will certainly be unfamiliar to the lives of many of his readers. Ultimately, Small Memories is a unique memoir but one that often lost my attention despite its brevity so I would recommend it mainly to those already familiar with Saramego and looking to learn a bit more about him. As for me, the memoir was not a great fit but I'll definitely be digging into one of his novels in the future.

Translated By: Margaret Jull Costa
Release Date: May 11th, 2011
Pages: 176
Source: ARC From Publisher 
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Mom: A Celebration of Mothers from StoryCorps edited by Dave Isay

When I picked up Mom: A Celebration of Mothers from StoryCorps edited by Dave Isay I had no idea what StoryCorps was or what I was in store for. StoryCorps is an American project, starting 2003, which gives ordinary people the opportunity to interview each other and be recorded for forty minutes. Two copies are made of these oral histories, one is given to the participants and the other is stored away for future generations at the Library of Congress. For Mom, Isay selected from more than fifty thousand interviews particularly memorable ones in which the person talks about their mother in some way. They are slightly edited for grammar and clarity, but each story maintains the distinct voice of the narrator, and at the end of the stories a photo of the participants is included. The non-fiction book is divided three sections: wisdom, devotion, and enduring love, with the histories separated based on the underlying theme. I thought it was a great way to emphasize three very important characteristics of a good mother.

The stories included in Mom definitely tend to be those that are unique or interesting in some way- a woman who married her daughter-in-law's father, one who gave birth to quintuplets over twenty years ago, a woman who finds her adopted son after fifty years apart- so they definitely don't blur together which was one of my initial concerns. Also, because they are basically transcripts of oral histories, as a reader it really feels like you are getting to know the person through their unique voice. Because of the huge array of stories and people included in the book despite its short length (only about 200 pages) I feel like every reader would be able to relate to at least a few stories within the book. I also loved how Isay didn't just include one type of mother, but also adoptive mothers, stepmothers, and mothers whose child had passed away. The stories range from humourous to heartbreaking, but they are connected by their ability to touch your heart. Overall, Mom is a great book which leaves you with an important message, to ask questions and make memories before it is too late.

Release Date: April 10th, 2010
Pages: 208
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This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.