RaveOprah DailyWhat a time to be alive and reading, when some of our keenest and most eloquent observers of the human heart are reaching the age when their parents die and therefore can—must?—be written about ... The results can be breathtaking ... The chapters attempt to alternate between the now of London and the many thens and theres of the narrator’s family history and her history as a writer, but her attention proves as fluid as the Thames, with even the present-day sections continually turning back to the past. It may not sound like much to hang a book on—in lesser hands you might call it a walkin’-and-thinkin’ story, and not in a nice way—but in fact there is action aplenty ... The story concludes with a last internal debate about its own possible crimes—but not before a final litany of the mother’s habits, abilities, and traits, a glorious biographical inventory at the end of which, deeply moved, one might have to turn aside and weep. Whoever is doing the writing—fictional narrator or real-life daughter—it’s such a close and loving description that you know she’d rather have the mother than the book.
