Month: December 2023

My Goodreads and Amazon review of The Shape of Normal: A Memoir of Motherhood, Disability & Embracing a Different Kind of Perfect by Catherine Shields (Rating 5) – Holding On, Letting Go. I approached The Shape of Normal: A Memoir of Motherhood, Disability & Embracing a Different Kind of Perfect by Catherine Shields from four perspectives: a reader; a writer (see my Amazon author page and Goodreads author page; a developmental psychologist specializing in early education; and a (grand)parent who wants those I love to get the best and be their best. Shields more than satisfied me on all those dimensions. Her memoir is an unstintingly honest, emotionally absorbing, and deeply personal narrative. It directly addresses the pros and cons of the educational, medical, and social-psychological systems designed to meet the needs of children with disabilities and their families. Above all, it invites readers to accompany Shields on her journey of discovery about her amazing daughter Jessica and, above all, herself. She doesn’t shy away from confronting the strains that having a child with disabilities places on a marriage and other siblings. Nor does she gloss over her own self-doubt, impatience, and anger. Shields hiked an uphill path, toting an image of what her child should be before letting go and accepting who she was. A good trekker, Shields faced each mile with better developed muscles and more inner strength. Then she wrote a perfect book.

A mother’s honest story of her journey to acceptance

Why writers read: “Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us how to live and die.” – Anne Lamott

My Amazon and Goodreads review of Tom Lake by Ann Patchett (Rating 4) – Four on the Aisle. In Ann Patchett’s novel Tom Lake, three rapt daughters urge their mother, Lara, to tell them about her early days as an actress while they pick cherries on the family farm in northern Michigan. Patchett’s narrative shifts smoothly between youth’s infatuation and midlife’s contentment. As a writer of multi-generational novels (see my Amazon author page and Goodreads author page), I admire her cross-age agility. Unfortunately, Patchett is less facile differentiating between the daughters, other than identifying them as the horticulturist, the veterinarian, and would-be actress. Lara’s beloved husband is also a cipher. And her fellow actors in Our Town, the Thornton Wilder play whose wistfulness infuses the novel, are briefly interesting as characters, but never emerge as people. Perhaps this indistinctness is the inevitable result of a narrative dominated by the storyteller mother. I wondered whether Patchett, herself a storyteller, wanted to be Lara, swept up in a whirlwind youth before happily settling into writing and owning a bookstore. If so, I get it. As I read Tom Lake, I spun my own “back in the day” story for my daughter and grandsons. I expect other readers will do the same. I hope they’re satisfied with the tales they tell themselves, because Patchett’s, while entertaining, does not merit a standing ovation when the curtain comes down.

A novel infused with the wistfulness of “Our Town”

Why writers write: “Why am I compelled to write? Because the world I create compensates for what the real world does not give me.” – Gloria E. Anzaldúa