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#5 Platform - Losing Mum and Pup
May. 3rd, 2012 12:54 amA light touch for a hard topic.
Book #19: Losing Mum and Pup
Author: Christopher Buckley
Provenance: Borrowed from Westmount Library
Sometimes, it's hard to tell what exactly the target audience for a book is meant to be. I'm a big Christopher Buckley fan, and I've read all his satire books from Thank You for Smoking onwards, but I didn't really know much more than cursory details about his father, William F. Buckley Jr., and pretty much zero about his mother, Patricia Taylor Buckley, both of whom were apparently really big figures in their own rights. This book, a memoir of the year from the death of his mother and subsequent grieving of her, the declining health and then death of his father, and then the start of the grieving process for him, was one that I passed up at first; it's not exactly the younger Buckley's oeuvre, it's not normally the type of book I read, and I didn't really have much in the way of curiosity in the final matters of his parents' lives, and the celebrations thereof.
But there it was, sitting there next to me in the biography section, and with Buckley on my mind anyway, what with his newest novel just about to come out, I decided to give it a try. The writing is typically wry, with some good turns of phrase, and some interesting takes on the absurdities of dealing with the end of life (never would our author have thought so much time and thought would hinge on the urine of his father). That said, he never loses touch of the pathos and sadness that comes from dealing with the deaths of his parents; the decline of his mother isn't dealt with in great detail, as one may surmise they weren't on the best of terms before then, but there are some good moments in dealing with her belongings after (letters from him that went unopened, for example), and the decline of the body and mind of his father, how his father tried to maintain himself, writing and talking, keeping his life in the best shape he was able to manage. He carries across real emotion, though, particularly how exasperating it can be to deal with very strong-willed people who aren't always quite there anymore. It's pretty well-balanced, though.
On the whole, this book is about what you'd expect, I suppose. Buckley manages a well-done, occasionally moving look at the process of losing one's parents, a tough time even when you're in your mid-50s. It's solid with good emotion, along with the dense and playful wordiness his books often have, and a perspective on everything that never veers too far in any direction. I don't know that I found it life-changing, but it was an interesting read, and I imagine for someone who is more in Buckley's situation might get more out of it than I did, as well. I think maybe I wasn't quite the target, but I enjoyed it well enough nevertheless.
Next up: A Corpse in the Koryo. North Korea!
Book #19: Losing Mum and Pup
Author: Christopher Buckley
Provenance: Borrowed from Westmount Library
Sometimes, it's hard to tell what exactly the target audience for a book is meant to be. I'm a big Christopher Buckley fan, and I've read all his satire books from Thank You for Smoking onwards, but I didn't really know much more than cursory details about his father, William F. Buckley Jr., and pretty much zero about his mother, Patricia Taylor Buckley, both of whom were apparently really big figures in their own rights. This book, a memoir of the year from the death of his mother and subsequent grieving of her, the declining health and then death of his father, and then the start of the grieving process for him, was one that I passed up at first; it's not exactly the younger Buckley's oeuvre, it's not normally the type of book I read, and I didn't really have much in the way of curiosity in the final matters of his parents' lives, and the celebrations thereof.
But there it was, sitting there next to me in the biography section, and with Buckley on my mind anyway, what with his newest novel just about to come out, I decided to give it a try. The writing is typically wry, with some good turns of phrase, and some interesting takes on the absurdities of dealing with the end of life (never would our author have thought so much time and thought would hinge on the urine of his father). That said, he never loses touch of the pathos and sadness that comes from dealing with the deaths of his parents; the decline of his mother isn't dealt with in great detail, as one may surmise they weren't on the best of terms before then, but there are some good moments in dealing with her belongings after (letters from him that went unopened, for example), and the decline of the body and mind of his father, how his father tried to maintain himself, writing and talking, keeping his life in the best shape he was able to manage. He carries across real emotion, though, particularly how exasperating it can be to deal with very strong-willed people who aren't always quite there anymore. It's pretty well-balanced, though.
On the whole, this book is about what you'd expect, I suppose. Buckley manages a well-done, occasionally moving look at the process of losing one's parents, a tough time even when you're in your mid-50s. It's solid with good emotion, along with the dense and playful wordiness his books often have, and a perspective on everything that never veers too far in any direction. I don't know that I found it life-changing, but it was an interesting read, and I imagine for someone who is more in Buckley's situation might get more out of it than I did, as well. I think maybe I wasn't quite the target, but I enjoyed it well enough nevertheless.
Next up: A Corpse in the Koryo. North Korea!
