Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li

Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Yiyun Li has written a sad story which begins: "There is no good way to state these facts, which must be acknowledged...My husband and I had two children and lost them both: Vincent in 2017, at sixteen, James in 2024, at nineteen. Both chose suicide, and both died not far from home." As one courageous friend writes to her an hour and a half after a child's death, "you did everything you could to help James find his place in life, but he wanted to leave and one must let go."

In reference to her brilliant son James, she mentions the memoir Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammet which captured how James felt about the world and another important book to him, The Reason I Jump: the Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism.

She ponders over the years between the two children's deaths, how James might be accepted by the world as a person "different from most people, maybe even for the world to benefit from his intelligence."

As many challenged her functionality afterwards, Li asks "what else can I do but to go on with the things I can do, to keep my body nourished and active and my mind occupied and sharp?" Marking time in piano playing and practice, knitting, games on her phone, reading, baking, pruning and feeding the roses, weeding "because weeds are part of nature, too, and things in nature merely grow."

I appreciated her comments on reactions from friends and her wish that people had the honesty and courage to say, I'm not capable of handling this difficult situation, or, I'm uncomfortable because I don't know what to say, rather than telling themselves that they are absenting themselves out of respect for the bereaved. The most comforting condolences were those expressing helplessness and the pain of not having the right words, not the clueless mentions of their own losses or how to overcome grief.

A sobering but instructive memoir.

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Heat Wave by Penelope Fitzgerald

Heat Wave by Penelope Lively
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What pleasure it is to be in the hands of a virtuoso writer. The pacing, sentences, descriptions, vocabulary, contribute to a thoughtful story of legitimate characters with a surprising ending. Pauline, a book editor, is spending the long, hot summer editing a novel while her daughter and grandson live next door. She says to her two-year-old grandson: "Oh, books, books...Terrible things, books. Cause nothing but trouble. You keep out of the book business, my lad. Commodity dealing for you. Or heart surgery. Or the construction of oil rigs." Occasionally, they are joined by her writer son-in-law whose philandering reminds Pauline of her own ex-husband. As the book jacket reveals of the ending, "a stunning and unexpected development changes the order of things irrevocably for this family."

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Bibliophobia by Sarah Chihaya
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Narrator's title is apt as she describes her depression and mental breakdown while a literature professor. My interest was more geared to what she read, books by Toni Morrison, Helen DeWitt, A. S. Byatt and Anne Carson, and interesting exploration of her traumatic response to these, but I struggled to relate to her obsession with reading and suicidal ideation. Indeed, different readers need different things from the same book and reader responses can differ over time, but my bent is bibliophilia.

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Loop by Brenda Lozano Loop by Brenda Lozano
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The narrator of Loop is a Mexican writer living in Mexico City, recently recovered from a serious accident, visiting friends and family, keeping a notebook (Ideal brand) of her activities and thoughts while her newish boyfriend, Jonás, is traveling in Spain. She fancies herself a Penelope reweaving a shroud to discourage suitors while Ulysses is off to war for twenty years. Jonás is only gone a matter of weeks, but his absence is uppermost in her mind. She ponders literary success, goes off to festivals, listens to music, reads books and wonders about her lover's fidelity, his grieving his mother. She concocts a chapter of proverbs on stories and writing, i.e. "Seek words, and there are none; no longer seek them and they shall come." She is alert to her neighborhood, to a dapper dwarf she keeps seeing on her block, to music (David Bowie) and to art, philosophy, authors Proust, Pessoa, Walser, Vila-Matas, Lispector, Kafka and poets. I found the easy literary chat, the discursive format, perfect bedtime reading. She reminds me a bit of Claire-Louise Bennett, perhaps Kate Zambreno, both favorites.
Another winner from Charco Press, translated by Annie McDermott - translator

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In My Time of Dying by Sebastian Junger

In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife by Sebastian Junger
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife starts off like a thriller as the author is rushed from home to the hospital for what is eventually diagnosed as a ruptured aneurysm in a pancreatic artery and internal hemorrhage. The bulk of the book is about his time in the hospital, including a "near death experience" vision of his late father, and alternates with other perilous experiences in his life as a war journalist. The latter part of the book hopscotches between physics, death and spirituality and my interest waned.

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Near Distance by Hanna Stoltenberg

Near Distance by Hanna Stoltenberg
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Near Distance by Hanna Stoltenberg is an apt title for the strained relationship of the mother and daughter in this prize-winning novel from Norway. The mother is a divorced woman of around fifty who enjoys the noncommittal aspects of online dating and sex, appreciates her drink, is uninterested in her job managing a jewelry store, and only occasionally sees her daughter and grandchildren. Most of the narrative is from her perspective. The daughter invites her to a "girls weekend" in London and reveals her purpose once they are in the plane. She is stalking her husband's mistress and wants moral support from her mother. They proceed to meet up with her daughter's old friends, become separated and drink too much. Extraordinary detail is provided of each bleak scene in this almost plotless novel which moves along at a sure pace with precise descriptions and skillful characterization. Each time I picked up the book, I remember thinking there is nothing happening here, yet I kept reading. I recommend it for its excellent prose and portrayals as well as Wendy H. Gabrielsen's superb translation. One reviewer described it as reminiscent of early Ian McEwan which fits.

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Daddy's Gone A-Hunting by Penelope Mortimer

Daddy's Gone A-Hunting by Penelope Mortimer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thoroughly depressing story of a woman's breakdown in a bad marriage with unsympathetic children in 1958. I loved it. Penelope Mortimer is a skilled writer with superb attention to detail and a real empathy for her main character. The adulterous husband is almost textbook awful. The dialogue is spot on, funny at times, accurate always. I was reminded of Ex-Wife, another sad tale of women's lot in the 1950's which I relished.

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