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Category: Parenting & Family

"Amen, Amen, Amen: Memoir of a Girl Who Couldn’t Stop Praying (Among Other Things)" by Abby Sher

[ 1 ] February 26, 2010

Reviewed by Carly M.

When Abby Sher was little, she had a habit of singing songs to herself in a particular way. She also had a habit of collecting certain bits of garbage that she saw in the street and kissing certain things just the right number of times. Most of all, Abby had a habit of praying and praying and praying.

In her memoir, Amen, Amen, Amen: Memoir of a Girl Who Couldn’t Stop Praying (Among Other Things), Abby Sher recounts in detail her experience of growing up with obsessive-compulsive disorder. Her story starts just before her father’s death, when Abby is on the brink of entering adolescence, unsure of anything around her. She finds peace and comfort in a few little rituals and habits that she’s picked up, like kissing and counting and praying. Before long, however, even Abby has to admit that there’s something strange about her behavior.

As Abby grows up, she faces the changes and traumas of life by adopting more and more rituals. Her faith in God and belief in the power of prayer takes on a frantic life of its own as Abby begins to feel more and more responsible for all of the events in her world. Her heartbreaking struggle to control and fix and save everyone and everything leads her down a rabbit hole of manic behaviors, until Abby finds herself trapped in an adulthood marked by compulsions, rituals, restrictions, and self-punishment.

This memoir is so wonderfully written that you can’t help but slip right into Abby’s world, even as she eventually faces an eating disorder and a compulsion to self-mutilate. It may be hard to understand how someone could end up as trapped in their own head as Abby did, but the author has spun such a compelling tale out of her micro-madness that I sat down and read this book from cover to cover in one sitting.

I’d strongly recommend Amen, Amen, Amen to anyone, even if the concept of obsessive-compulsive disorder is completely alien. I feel like this memoir offers and important, and rare, glimpse into this all-too-common condition and the lives of those who live with it or deal with it in other people. This was my first encounter with Abby Sher, but now I feel I know her so well that I can’t wait to encounter another of her books.

Carly lives in Salt Lake City, Utah, with her husband and their two cats. Her favorite thing to do is to curl up by a window with a library book. When she isn’t reading, she’s usually writing on her blog at www.beingcarly.com.

This book was provided free of any obligation by Scribner. No monetary or any other form of compensation was received.

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Friday Cravings

[ 1 ] January 15, 2010
So my pick this week is once again from PaperBackSwap.com! I’m finding it to be quite a treasure trove. Perhaps I should change the name of this column to PaperBackSwap Finds…
Have a book that you’re craving to add to your collection? I’d love to hear from you! The books do not have to be new or upcoming releases. Leave a link to your own post in the comment area and link it back to Luxury Reading. If you don’t have a blog, just list the book and the author.
Pick of the Week
It is 1950 in glittering, vibrant New York City. Lucia Sartori is the beautiful twenty-five year old daughter of a prosperous Italian grocer in Greenwich Village. The postwar boom is ripe with opportunities for talented girls with ambition, and Lucia becomes an apprentice to an up-and-coming designer at chic B. Altman’s department store on Fifth Avenue. 
Engaged to her childhood sweetheart, the steadfast Dante DeMartino, Lucia is torn when she meets a handsome stranger who promises a life of uptown luxury that career girls like her only read about in the society pages. Forced to choose between duty to her family and her own dreams, Lucia finds herself in the midst of a sizzling scandal in which secrets are revealed, her beloved career is jeopardized, and the Sartoris’ honor is tested.
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Review: This Lovely Life by Vicky Forman

[ 1 ] August 23, 2009

Reviewed by Kayla S. 

This Lovely Life is so unbiased, so agenda-free that it’s easy to forget that it’s a memoir. It is the story of Vicky Foreman and her experience as the mother of two super-premature babies. After Foreman ordered a “do-not-resuscitate” mandate upon the children’s birth, knowing that the babies would most likely grow into severely disabled children, the hospital refused to comply. Years later, during which Foreman dedicated her life to her children, her son Evan matured into a severely disabled and blind child.

I was sure the story would become political. I was ready for the memoir to morph into a tirade, in which Foreman would blame the hospital for ruining her life and the life of her children. Instead, I continued to read a heartbreakingly honest, realistically ambivalent narrative.

Foreman should be applauded for her undying loyalty to her children, and it was a pleasure to even read her story. She is also equally loyal to the subject itself, so don’t expect any wordy décor or style-heavy writing. She tells the facts, but accessibly so, explaining all medical terms and using them sparingly so as not to overwhelm. And as the product of a well-educated writer, the story flows effortlessly.

This Lovely Life is engaging enough to intrigue anyone even mildly interested in ethics or motherhood or even the medical field (it is often fiercely insightful regarding the doctor-to-patient dynamic). I would also especially recommend it to those who are or have been surrounded by any of these themes.

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Review: Old World Daughter, New World Mother by Maria Laurino

[ 0 ] July 24, 2009

Reviewed by Kayla S.

“When a recent global research poll asked people to respond to the statement ‘Success in life is pretty much determined by forces outside our control,’ a large majority of Italians agreed. Americans, on the other hand, overwhelmingly disagreed, reaffirming the belief that we are self-directed individuals who can shape our own destiny.”

Old World Daughter, New World Mother is an essay-dipped-in-memoir, an account of a woman who struggles with the tension between how her mother raised her, and how America raised her. The former, who toiled in the kitchen, proclaimed family life over the individual, and refused to find a job, is who she first rebelled against, opting for college and classes on Feminism instead. The book details how this translated in her experience with Manhattan newspaper The Village Voice, as a speechwriter for top politicians, and most importantly, in having a child of her own, and how she comes to terms with both facets of her upbringing.

This is a wonderfully honest account of how two schools of thought are forced together in the hyphen of “Italian-American”. And no, you do not have to be from Sicily to understand the influence. She uses hilarious examples from the commonly accepted stereotypes, like “the Sopranos” for instance, to draw you in to the Italian mindset.

Above all, the book is very research-based. And your inner style monitor might be confused when she switches from personal accounts to Rousseauean dogmas. Her pedantic nature is relentless; if the occasionally heady, academic material on Feminism, economics, and social constructs of the family bothers you, this may not be the book for you. But if you’re up for the mental stimulus, it is a refreshing fusion of art and reason that delights and challenges simultaneously.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has ever found themselves mystified by the relative peace of foreign cultures. You will learn so much about how being an American has shaped you, whether you recognize it or not. And I would especially recommend this book to mothers, or anyone interested in what the author calls “the sacrifice of motherhood”. She offers up endless knowledge on pregnancy, birth, and what it means to be a working mother.

Maria Laurino has done a brilliant job of adding substance to the standard, nostalgic memoir, by applying it to universal concepts that you, even if not an Italian mother or daughter, will appreciate.

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Review: Annie’s Ghosts by Steve Luxenberg

[ 1 ] July 16, 2009

Reviewed by Sarah C.

Beth Luxenberg was an only child. Everyone from her children to new-found acquaintances were aware of this fact. So when her secret emerges her son Steven is left bewildered. After all, his mother had always taught them that above all – they must tell the truth.

Beth – nearly eighty and in poor health – consults a new doctor and casually mentions a sister, whom she claims was sent away at the age of two. She knows not of the reason, nor of her sister’s fate.

Beth dies six months later, in 1999, and the secret re-emerges with a name… Annie.

Steven begins diving into his mother’s past, where he uncovers more than he could hope to find. His mother had grown up together with her sister who had not been hospitalized at the age of two, but at twenty-one. Annie spent her life in a mental institution while Beth set out to hide her sister’s existence from the world.

Why?

Annie’s Ghosts will capture you from the first few sentences and will not leave you even after the final page is turned and the book set to rest on a shelf. It carries a haunting element impossible to shake yet ends in a satisfactory manner, leaving the reader content. It is truly beautifully written and does not burden with too much detail, but instead gives enough to keep one interested.

Annie’s Ghosts was a book I could not put down, and I guarantee no one else will.

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Review: Happens Every Day by Isabel Gillies

[ 1 ] May 2, 2009

Reviewed by Vera Pereskokova (Luxury Reading)

I first saw Happens Every Day: An All-Too-True Story by Isabel Gillies at Starbucks and considering the fact that I’ve loved every “Starbucks book” I ever picked up, this one went on my to-read list as well.

For the fans of Law & Order: SVU – Isabel Gillies had a recurring role on the show playing Kathy Stabler. While at a wedding, Gillies reconnects with her childhood friend Josiah (I believe that’s a pseudonym), and the two initiate a relationship and eventually get married. Moving around to accommodate Josiah’s job as a college professor, the couple winds up in Oberlin, Ohio with their two young boys. Worlds away from the hustle and bustle of New York City, Gillies nevertheless builds a life for herself and her family in the quiet town. They buy and renovate a house, make friends, and Gillies even begins teaching acting at the college. All of a sudden, Josiah announces that he’s leaving Isabel and their two sons, and that he just “can’t do it” anymore.

Gillies is desperate to save her marriage, but Josiah has checked out with no desire to work on their relationship. No amount of tears, pleading, and inquiries from friends and family can change his mind. Gillies suspects that Josiah is involved with his colleague Sylvia, but often ignores her intuition when both Josiah and Sylvia insist that they are just friends. In perhaps the most heart-wrenching bit of the story, Josiah makes Gillies apologize to the other woman for insinuating that they are having an affair. What a way to displace his own guilt!

Happens Every Day was like sneaking a peak at someone’s diary; Gillies left out nothing in describing the nitty gritty details of her marriage and subsequent divorce. The result is a heart-wrenching story that made me want to reach out and tell Gillies, “Oh no! Don’t do that!”, only to realize that I’d probably do the same thing given the situation. In the end though, Gillies’ story is one of survival, hope, and happy endings.

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Review: Love in the Driest Season: A Family Memoir by Neely Tucker

[ 1 ] March 11, 2009

Reviewed by Vera Pereskokova(Luxury Reading)

It’s rare that a book gives me one of those “I’m about to cry” moments, but Love in the Driest Season: A Family Memoir was just one of those rare books. The last time a crying moment happened was when I was reading Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and the funny thing is, I barely remember that story line, but I definitely remember that it made me very emotional. The difference between the two books is that Love in the Driest Season was a much more positive, I’m-glad-it worked-out moment.

Love in the Driest Season is told by Neely Tucker, a foreign correspondent who traversed the globe and saw more misery and death than any human should in a lifetime. Shortly after getting married, Tucker accepted a post in Zimbabwe, thinking it would be just another reporting job. Tucker, a white man from Mississippi, and his African-American wife Vita packed up their belongings, and made the track to the capital city Harare. They found the country beautiful, but ravaged by AIDS; the effects of the disease were seen everywhere. Millions of children were orphaned with one or both parents dead, orphanages were overflowing and the government was ignoring the problem.

Wanting to help, Neely and Vita began volunteering at a local orphanage, with the intention of taking some kids home with them for the weekends. The first day there, they came across a tiny infant named Chipo, and instantly fell in love with the little girl. They found out that Chipo was abandoned at birth, thrown into a grass field with her umbilical cord still attached. She was found by some locals covered in blood and dirt, and eventually transported to the orphanage. Chipo was severely underweight, struggling to breath and to survive. Neely and Vita could not have kids of their own, and finding Chipo, they considered adoption to be a viable option.

Together, they nursed Chipo back to health, from a sickly baby with no responses, to a happy toddler. They also discovered the prejudices that exist against foreigners adopting Zimbabwean children, and battled with the system to keep their daughter.

In addition to being a beautiful family memoir of love and perseverance, Love in the Driest Season is a masterful account of the situation in Zimbabwe, as well as other African countries, at that time. Tucker talks about the effects of AIDS on the population, the senseless civil unrests going on in various regions, the bombing of the American embassy in Nairobi, the lack of order, the overly pompous leaders who care little about the people they govern, and so on.

Love in the Driest Season is just a wonderful memoir that will make you think, learn a thing or two, and maybe even have the “I’m about to cry” moment as well.

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