The Books of 2018

I must say I had a stellar year for reading. I do believe the best since I started this annual list of all books read in the previous year. I attribute that to less responsibilities and more retirement. Moving to a 1 bedroom apartment has been a boon for this reader, assisted by a fabulous library close by and the ease of on line library book reservations. A tossing of books policy has strengthened due to (a) my advancing years and (b) impatience with poor writing, editing, construction and characterization. This rule is broken for book club selections as I feel honourbound to complete those reads, no matter how agonizing. I do try and file a wee book report on Good Reads where I can be found at: GOODREADS WWW REVIEWS
And my ten years of books read and rated can be found at Ten Years of Books Read and Rated


Here be the list:

(1)The Years Flew By - Sidney Gifford ("John Brennan")
(2)Books Art Life - Kyo MacLear***** review on Goodreads
(3)Suite Francaise - Irine Nemirovsky** {BC}
(4)Miss Emily - Nuala O'Connor***** review on Goodreads
(5)The End of Music - Jamie Fitzpatrick****1/2 review on Goodreads
(6)Mercury - Margot Livesy**** GR
(7)The Woman in Cabin 10 - Ruth Ware 0 GR
(8)The Unseen World - Liz Moore ***** - best of the year so far. Review on GR
(10)Too Close to the Falls - Catherine Gildiner ****
(11)A Labrador Woman - Elizabeth Goudie ***** {BC}
(12)The Woman Upstairs - Claire Messud*****
(13)The Widow - Fiona Barton****
(14)The Child - Fiona Barton*****
(15)Remarkable Creatures - Tracy Chevalier***** {BC}
(16)The Lying Game - Ruth Ware*
(17)A Splendid Boy - Melanie Martin**
(18)The Ninth Hour - Alice McDermott****
(19)In the Land of Birdfishes - Rebecca Silver Slayer* Tossed
(20)The Burning Girl - Claire Messud*****
(21)Most Anything You Please - Trudy Morgan Cole *****
(22)The Alice Network - Kate Quinn **** (far, far too long)
(23)When Breath Becomes Air - Paul Kalanithi *****
(24)Priestdaddy - Patricia Lockwood
(25)Bellevue Square - Michael Redhill - *Review on GR Winner of the Giller? Don't understand.
(26)The Nightingale - Kristin Hannah {BC} - savouring every page.***** Mind.Blown. GR
(27)The Ice Princess - Camilla Lackberg 0 worst of the year so far GR
(28)The Emperor's Children - Claire Messud *****
(29) I let you go - Claire Mackintosh **** Oops, read before years ago caught 1/2 way thru :(
(30)Ledger of the Open Hand - Leslie Vryenhoek {BC}** A slog, would have dropped only {BC}
(31)Mind's Eye - Hakan Nesser - 0 dropped at Page 65 when main character brags about slapping his wife around.
(32)The Body and Other Parties - Carmen Maria Machado ** Different, pornish, Dropped 1/2 way through when it became a riff on Law and Order.
(33)Little Deaths - Emma Flint ***
(34)The Good House - Ann Leary *****
(35)The Woman in the Window - A.J. Finn 0 truly awful
(36)Felicity - Mary Oliver ***
(37)After Her - Joyce Maynard*****
(38)Sleep No More - P.D. James****
(39)The Housekeeper and the Professor - Yoko Agawa****
(40)Too Unspeakable for Words - Rosalind Gill****
(41)Orphan Train - Christine Baker Kline*****
(42)From a Good House - Trudi Johnson {BC}***
(43)the Life we Bury - Allen Askens*****
(44)Labor Day - Joyce Maynard *****
(45)Under the Influence - Joyce Maynard*****
(46)Baby Love - Joyce Maynard*****
(47)Faithful - Alice Hoffman **
(48)The Great Alone - Kristin Hannah ***
(49)The Glass Character - Margaret Gunning**
(50)The Perfection of the Morning - Sharon Butala****
(51)The Children - Ann Leary***
(52)Delta Wedding - Eudora Welty****
(53)The Museum of Extraordinary Things - Alice Hoffman****
(54)Before We Were Yours - Lisa Wingate*****
(55)Anger - May Sarton*****
(56)The Education of Harriet Hatfield - May Sarton*****
(57)Station Eleven - Emily St. John Mandel****
(58)The Chilbury Ladies' Choir - Jennifer Ryan****
(59)The Montreal Massacre - Louise Malette, Marie Chalouh
(60)The Rosie Project - Graeme Simsion****
(61)The Wife - Meg Wolitzer***
(62)Christmas in Paris - Hazel Gaymore, Heather Webb*****
(63)The Marrow Thieves - Cherie Dimoline 0 not in mood, dropped.
(64)Encore - May Sarton****
(65)Sing, Unburied Sing - Jesmyn Ward 0 Tired of theme, dropped
(66)Being Mary Roe - Ida Linehan Young, won't rate but finished.
(67)Educated - Tara Westover*****
(68)Women Talking - Miriam Toews***
(69)When the Lights Go Out - Mary Kubica 0
(70)The Home for Unwanted Girls - Joanna Goodman*****
(71)Burning Bright - Tracy Chevalier{BC}*
(72)Wildlife - Richard Ford*****
(73)The Girl from the Savoy - Hazel Gaynor 0
(74)The Rosie Effect - Graeme Simson****
(75)A History of Loneliness - John Boyne*****
(76)Asking for It - Louise O'Neill*****
(77)All My Puny Sorrows - Miriam Toews {BC} a re-read from 2014
(78)Women with Men - Richard Ford****
(79)The Finishing School - Joanna Goodman*
(80)Reading in Bed - Sue Gee****
(81)From a Low and Quiet Sea - Donal Ryan*****
(82)The Perfect Nanny - Leila Slimani****
(83)The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - John Boyne*****
(84)Shadow of a Man - May Sarton****
(85)The House of All Sorts - Emily Carr****
(86)Days Without End - Sebastian Barry*****

And here be the best of the best. And on the whole it was a very rich reading year.

Books Art Life - Kyo MacLear*****
The Unseen World - Liz Moore *****
Miss Emily - Nuala O'Connor*****
The Nightingale - Kristin Hannah***** {BC}
Under the Influence - Joyce Maynard*****
Before We Were Yours - Lisa Wingate*****
Anger - May Sarton*****
Christmas in Paris - Hazel Gaymore, Heather Webb*****
The Home for Unwanted Girls - Joanna Goodman*****
Wildlife - Richard Ford*****
A History of Loneliness - John Boyne*****
From a Low and Quiet Sea - Donal Ryan*****
Days Without End - Sebastian Barry*****

The absolute very gripping best were The Nightingale, Days without End and The Unseen World.

Day 17

All is well.

I found this to be one of the most delightful and funny obituaries I have ever read. So thought to share it with you all. 

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Published: January 22, 2021

Margaret Marilyn DeAdder of Moncton, Nova Scotia - Obituary. 

Margaret Marilyn DeAdder, professional clipper of coupons, baker of cookies, terror behind the wheel, champion of the underdog, ruthless card player, and self-described Queen Bitch, died on Tuesday, January 19, 2021. Marilyn, the oldest of four siblings, was born Marilyn Joyce in 1942, to parents Hannah and Edgar Joyce, in New Glasgow. She grew up in a modest home, which still stands on the top of a hill where the Westville Road forks to the Town of Westville in one direction and the old drive-in in the other. Growing up with very little taught her how to turn a dime into a dollar, a skill at which she'd excel her whole life. 

Marilyn loved all children who weren't her own and loved her own children relative to how clean-shaven they were. She excelled at giving the finger, taking no shit and laughing at jokes, preferably in the shade of blue. She did not excel at suffering fools, hiding her disdain, and putting her car in reverse. A voracious reader, she loved true crime, romance novels and the odd political book. Trained as a hairdresser before she was married, she was always doing somebody's hair in her kitchen, so much so her kitchen smelled of baking and perm solution. Marilyn had a busy life, but no matter what she was doing she always made time to run her kids' lives as well. Her lifelong hobbies included painting, quilting, baking, gardening, hiking and arson. Marilyn loved tea and toast. The one thing she loved more than tea and toast was reheated tea and toast. She reheated tea by simply turning on the burner often forgetting about it. She burned many a teapot and caused smoke damage countless times, leaving her kids with the impression that fanning the smoke alarm was a step in brewing tea.

Marilyn liked to volunteer and give back to the community. She was a lifelong volunteer at the Capital Theatre in downtown Moncton, which her sons suspected was her way of seeing all the shows for free. For all of Marilyn's success in life, her crowning achievement occurred in the mid-to-late eighties, when, left with mounting debt, no job, no car, and no driver's license, she turned it all around to the point in the early nineties that she had paid down her house, paid cash for all her cars, and got her three boys through university.

Marilyn is survived by her three ungrateful sons, Michael (Gail), Paul and David (Trudy), whose names she never got completely right, and whose jokes she didn't completely understand. She loved them very much, even though at least one of them would ruin Christmas every year by coming home with facial hair, and never forgot that one disastrous Christmas in which all three sons showed up with beards. Everything she did, she did for her sons.

Marilyn is survived by her three granddaughters, Meaghan (19), Bridget (16) and Madelyn (5). While her sons committed unspeakable crimes against humanity, her granddaughters could do no wrong. While her sons grew up on root vegetables and powdered milk (funneled directly into the bag to hide the fact that it was powdered, fooling nobody), her granddaughters were fed mountains of sugary snacks as far as the eye could see, including her world-famous cookies and cinnamon rolls. Her love for them was unmatched.

Marilyn is survived by her sisters, Melda and Linda, and her brother, Lloyd, who still owes her $600* (*inside family joke - sorry, Lloyd). Marilyn is also survived by an incredible number of close friends, who cannot be named for fear of missing somebody.

Marilyn, ever the penny-pincher, decided to leave this world on the day Moncton went into red-alert, her sons believe, to avoid paying for a funeral. But, on the other hand, she always said that she didn't want a funeral, she wanted an Irish wake. She didn't want everybody moping around, she wanted a party. Marilyn will get her Celebration of Life when COVID-19 is over. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that you do something nice for somebody else unexpectedly, and without explanation. We love you, mom, a bushel and a peck. A bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck.

The Unspeakable Part 2

Dear Bill:

As we stood in front of your daughter’s casket tonight you shared your personal story with me. Gently. Without self-pity, shame or blame.

Your mother died when you were five. There were five children and you were the eldest. Your father couldn’t cope so he put you into a home, you didn’t say what kind, the baby was adopted and the remaining three children were put into foster care. And your father vanished from your life.

You were able to reconnect with your siblings in later life, apart from the adopted brother whom you’ve never found. Four years ago, one of your brothers died suddenly of an aneurysm too. And it crosses your mind now, that that was probably the cause of your mother’s death as well. So you and your surviving son and daughter are having tests to determine if you are at risk. It would be dreadful to lose another child and perhaps it could be preventable.

You were overwhelmed with the turnout for your daughter, the funeral home was packed, the flowers banked around the casket, bulletin boards of her photos everywhere. You were so proud of her - she was responsible, honest, an excellent mother to her teenage daughter and a devoted wife to her husband who was of different race and religion. You were grateful that your younger daughter took charge of the funeral and all the arrangements as it was completely beyond your capacity to do so.

You named and aged your six grandchildren who were playing quietly in another room. As children do even when unbearable grief is all around them. Your face had that soft look around the edges that we get when all the tears have been wrung out of us and we feel as if our very skin could melt away leaving the raw bones.

You've had more pain than most, Bill. All I could think of was: how bloody unfair, how absolutely bloody awful is the rotten hand you’d been dealt in this game of life.

But you never said this.

You affirmed your faith was strong and you knew that your daughter, your firstborn, was in a better place.

I need you to know, Bill, that I admire your dignity and courage in the face of such overwhelming loss. I'm a little better as a person tonight, a little more grateful, a little more in the moment.

And for that, I thank you, Bill.

Condolences

It's a very rough day for me when three condolence cards have to be written and mailed. I'm not a believer in platitudes and pre-printed sympathy cards. I like to do a little eulogy of my particular memories of the deceased to the grieving loved ones. I'm in complete isolation apart from the two in my bubble. Not that I could attend funerals or wakes anyway as such gatherings are disallowed in the Time of the Plague.

The first was to a dear friend of  over forty years duration whose mother had died just shy of her hundredth birthday. A difficult one to write as she and her mother were not deeply connected. My friend is very honourable and was incredibly dutiful to her mother in her last residence in a home for retired military. I liked her mum, British to the backbone, sharp-tongued and judgy, careless with money. And quite selfish. As someone else's mum can be to our great amusement, but not our own. Heaven forbid. She never took the time to get to know her numerous grandchildren and great-grandchilden. So I wrote about the great old Irish expression when the last parent dies :"Now the roof is off your life," which has great depth if you ponder on  it.

The second was to a friend of some fifteen years whose daughter died when an ambulance was delayed. She had a problem with her leg (blood clot? - it would be intrusive to ask). She was in her early forties and leaves three children, the youngest is ten. This couple lost their eldest a few years back, he was a non-verbal autistic and died from a seizure. I can't imagine their grief. She was his favourite child, full of vim and vigor and they would run together and raise funds for autism. I've written about the death of one's child a few times. It is unspeakable.

The third was particularly hard as I wrote about this multi-talented man here.  I can't re-read it without bursting into tears. We spent more time with him this past summer and cooked for him and his partner in our rental up in the Great Northern Peninsula. He knew his gig was up for a while and opted for death with dignity. Effing cancer. Effing cancer. So I wrote to his partner citing his wonderful attributes and that magical night we spent when he played for us. 

And it was the last time.

The Unspeakable Part 3

I wonder how us humans bear the pain of life sometimes.

I've written about this before.

The death of one's child.

And it happens again. In my community. To a lovely man who chats with me every morning as he takes his daily constitutional. Always dressed beautifully in soft khakis and a walking stick (to ward off unwarranted attention from the odd stray dog, he tells me).
Dan lost his wife a couple of year ago to cancer, a lingering death which broke his heart. This couple gave a lot to the community. She so much that I will write about it sometime.

Yesterday he gets the unbearable news that his youngest child, 44 years old, died from chronic alcoholism. All attempts to help him failed. I can't even describe the pain Dan is going through.

I saw the effects of the death of a child up close and personal with my grandmother who lost a whole chunk of herself that never came back after her daughter, my mother, died far too young.

And more recently, a beloved aunt lost her youngest of 49 to the ravages of cigarette cancer. Yes, I always insist on calling it that. And she lost most of herself and had to be put into care. A woman who was a golfer and bridge player only a month before.

And then, at my high school reunion a month or so ago, one of my classmates, herself in the after-affects of radiation and chemotherapy and barely able to walk, shared that four months before her 38 year old daughter, 3 months after giving birth to her last child, had died suddenly of an aneurism.

Heroes? I don't have to look very far.

They should all get a medal just for suiting up and showing up.

For the day that's in it.

I'm taking that to heart.

Along with acceptance. And being mindful to stay where my hands are. To be joyful for others. To feel the deep empathy and sadness for others' unbelievable tragedies. On December 23rd, a man and woman I greatly admire, for many, many qualities (kindness, gentility, commitment to their own health in the worst of weather conditions, pillars of support when their son and his wife took on the raising of abandoned twin grandsons, their great-grandsons and so on)lost their beloved teenage granddaughter in a stupid, careless, dumb automobile accident. Unspeakable. Truly. Good people suffering the unbearable. I can't imagine.

Grandgirl was here. We love her, we do. But she's gone now. Back to grinding school work and intense studying, a part-time job and her incredible social life. She really doesn't understand rural living in spite of the changing seascapes and breathtaking sunsets and wilderness. I don't think I did at her age either. My life was the city. And also in Toronto for years and years. I get it.

But a craving for peace sets in in later years, away from the madding crowd, and I knew if I didn't jump then, I never would. So here I am, enjoying this serenity of living, no sidewalks, ocean at my doorstep and a life I only ever whispered about as I was afraid I would jinx it.

And I get social fulfilment when I need it. Like yesterday. An all day "Hash Party", no not that kind, but every bit of leftovers from Christmas put on heated platters that run down the kitchen for about 12 feet, never seen the like, and an enormous cast of characters coming in and out of my friend's house, from all walks of life where one is encouraged to talk of the past year and travels and achievements and hear of everyone else's. A Boxing Day tradition for Daughter, Grandgirl and I.

And friends from the city call and we chat and one is visiting me again later on this year.

And all is good.

And kindness.

Yes.

On Acting Like a Grown-up.

Avoidance.

One of my defects.

I'm not good at confrontation, I do not express anger well (running and hiding), I write better than I speak - though lately some would dispute that. I've been on teevee, and on radio in the past week. People come to me, say: you were so articulate. I am pleased, having been advised years ago never to watch or listen to one's self on media. I am wordy, but only in my head, on paper, on my laptop, in my texts where I reign myself in, who wants to read, on a tiny screen, my endless priceless prose?

You see, I was avoiding something inevitable.

My own demise.

And putting measures in place so my daughter, who has MS, is not over-burdened with my managerial ineptitude and, well, pre-mortem avoidance.

So I see a lawyer, and explain things. My last will was written, oh, well over twenty five years ago. Circumstances change. And I mention the unmentionable too:

"What happens if my daughter predeceases me?"

And he was pleased, I could tell, that he didn't have to inject such an unspeakable into our conversation.

And he advised me on the other major concern I had: my missing child, who may, oh lord, show her face upon my death, and cause even more incredible pain and havoc for the child who has already seen far too much of it herself.

"Write a lengthy and utterly clear codicil," he added,"Outline the reasons she has no say in the distribution of your estate or in your living will. Make it uncontestable."

"The thing is," he added, "We need to make this bullet-proof, and I must say, more people should do this. It eases the pain of what is extraordinarily stressful for the survivors, you are very mature in your thinking."

Mature!

The first time in my life I've ever heard this word applied to me.

Now, something else ~ has anyone out there planned a green funeral?

What? You're not going to die, ever?

Alrighty then.

The Unspeakable

Tonight I’m going to a funeral home. With my daughter.

A school friend of hers died suddenly from a brain aneurysm. Leaving a fifteen-year-old daughter and a beloved husband. And her parents. I worked with this young woman’s mother back in the day and knew her daughter. Tonight I’m going there for the mother.

Last year while I was in Newfoundland, another friend lost her son, very suddenly. He had beaten cancer but died rapidly, and ironically, from pneumonia as his immune system was compromised from chemotherapy.

I grieved with her via mail and email and saw her last Saturday. Visible pain encased her whole body and it is eight months later. All one can do is hold her fragile body really tightly. There are absolutely no words.

I had dinner with my daughter last night and as regular readers will know, she is not well. Looking at her, I found it unimaginable to think of losing her.

Outliving one’s own child is by far the greatest tragedy of all.