RaveWashington PostAs titles go, it’s an impressive combination of witty, sad and memorable — just like the book itself ... We can trust her not to romanticize life’s big moments. Monumental though they may be, they are often messy, confusing, and oddly timed — and Ephron is going to be straight with us about it ... Ephron is not sugarcoating this story, remember? Things get dark ... Breaking sentences and phrases into speaking rhythms, Ephron encourages us not to see her prose on the page so much as to hear a story told in her voice ... Ephron made it to the other side of her illness, a vantage point from which she could look back and craft her story with a perspective those writers didn’t live to have. But she also never loses sight of the fact that while a book’s ending might be considered happy or sad depending on where the plot stops, all of us human beings are headed for the same ending sooner or later ... Although death saturates this book, it is far from a downer. To the emphatic contrary, it is a joy. As much as Ephron honors the true depths of fear, sickness, and sorrow, she also celebrates with humor and awe the great fortune of small thrills ... That’s the singular, lovely magic of this particular memoir by this particular writer about this particular slice of her life. When she examines \'life and death in close focus, side by side,\' she reminds us that darkness makes the light look even brighter.
Hiro Arikawa, Trans. by Philip Gabriel
PositiveThe Washington Post\"The sections in which we find out how and why Satoru came to love these people provide more than incidental backstory. In fact, some of Arikawa’s best storytelling happens in these passages ... Occasionally, Nana’s understanding of the human world feels like a bit of a stretch ... It may make you cry, just a little, but it will also make you take stock of your friendships and ask yourself: If you could take a road trip to be reunited with just a few people from your past, whom would you visit?\
Sally Field
RaveParnassus MusingWhen I read Sally Field’s memoir, In Pieces, the first time, I didn’t move from my sofa for three hours. After I finished, I picked up my phone, which was pinging with texts from fellow Parnassus staffers asking, How’s the book? What did you think? It took me a minute to figure out how to respond. Then I texted back one word, in all caps: SURPRISING ... Field’s memoir shines brightest and stuns most when she writes about family. Revealing disturbing events from her childhood and how they impacted her life, she opens up a recurring theme of damage and healing ... Reading In Pieces feels like having a glass of wine with a wise, kind, funny friend who isn’t afraid to get real with you about the hard stuff.
