The Hero of This Book
Ratings9
Average rating3.2
15
Ratings9
Average rating3.2
Named a Top Ten Best Book of the Year by Time and People Named a Best Book of the Year by: Washington Post * Kirkus Reviews * New Yorker * Chicago Public Library * NPR * Oprah Daily * Philadelphia Enquirer A taut, groundbreaking, and highly acclaimed novel from bestselling and award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken, about a writer’s relationship with her larger-than-life mother—and about the very nature of writing, memory, and art Ten months after her mother’s death, the narrator of The Hero of This Book takes a trip to London. The city was a favorite of her mother’s, and as the narrator wanders the streets, she finds herself reflecting on her mother’s life and their relationship. Thoughts of the past meld with questions of the future: Back in New England, the family home is now up for sale, its considerable contents already winnowed. The narrator, a writer, recalls all that made her complicated mother extraordinary—her brilliant wit, her generosity, her unbelievable obstinacy, her sheer will in seizing life despite physical difficulties—and finds herself wondering how her mother had endured. Even though she wants to respect her mother’s nearly pathological sense of privacy, the woman must come to terms with whether making a chronicle of this remarkable life constitutes an act of love or betrayal. The Hero of This Book is a searing examination of grief and renewal, and of a deeply felt relationship between a child and her parents. What begins as a question of filial devotion ultimately becomes a lesson in what it means to write. At once comic and heartbreaking, with prose that delights at every turn, this is a novel of such piercing love and tenderness that we are reminded that art is what remains when all else falls away.
Reviews with the most likes.
I was too impatient for this book; maybe it would have been better for me to listen. It reads like an extended and reflective memoir wherein the author and/or the narrator is processing the death of her complicated, vibrant, and differently-abled mother. I appreciated her insights and candor, but right now, I need a bit more plot and distraction from my fiction. Like some reviewers here, I found the mystery around whether this is memoir or fiction or auto-fiction kind of distracting. Still, I recommend this for anyone who has a bit more patience in their reading or listening, and is interested in thinking about memory, grief, motherhood/daughterhood, and writing. The author/narrator is a writer who describes the craft with authority and sympathy.
