An occasionally poignant but mostly dismal memoir of loss and its many manifestations.
A chronicle of the relationship between two sisters struggling to “solve the mystery of individuality and connection.”
Goldman (Early Leaving, 2008, etc.) begins in 1992, with the discovery of a “mass” in her breast. When she called her sister, Brenda, the next day, Brenda told her that she felt “calcifications” in her breast. Their biopsies occurred one day apart; the author’s diagnosis was benign, but her sister’s was malignant. For Goldman, the cancer encapsulated their respective images: she sweet and prim (like her mother), her sister tougher (like their father.) She explains that as the younger sibling, she followed her sister's lead; in turn, her sister was protective. Goldman then skips back to 1974, when her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Two years later, her father suffered a recurrence of colon cancer. The stress of the situation contributed to a serious rift between the sisters, a breach of intimacy that they struggled to repair during the ensuing years. Goldman’s parents had played an important part in helping them maintain their close bond as sisters. With them gone, writes the author, she experienced a belated rebellion against her sister. In an unsuccessful attempt to repair their apparently broken relationship, the sisters even tried couples' therapy. After their mother's death, they reconciled for a while, but the cycle repeated itself. Although her sister's fatal illness brought them close again, Goldman was left bereft but determined to claim her independence.
An occasionally poignant but mostly dismal memoir of loss and its many manifestations.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-89587-583-9
Page Count: 228
Publisher: John F. Blair
Review Posted Online: June 20, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
