This is one of those books that I stared at in the bookstore for months. I had to have it. It'll be for research I told myself since I'm writing my own memoir at the moment. One trip to the store with Richard when he told me to buy what I wanted.
"You deserve it," he said.
My willpower had ebbed to a low point where I couldn't push his kind and loving words to the back of my mind. I bought the book. He wanted me to have it. I gave myself permission to blame my impulsiveness on Richard.
To the book itself. In the beginning we learn of Rhoda's surgery and tragic car accident. Then we learn of her failed marriage to the bipolar and really wacko Nick, who dumps her for Bob from Gay.com. Supposedly she goes home to her Mennonite roots to convalesce. Only the problem with the whole thing is that I never had a clear sense of where Rhoda actually was during this time.
Were there some absolutely belly laugh funny moments. Yes!! Her stoic parents and stories about lunch pails and long skirts were delightful. They seemed to move back and forth through time and place so that I never really knew where exactly they happened or what prompted her memory of them. She's cooking in her mother's kitchen and then she's back to work teaching living in her Michigan lake house. All in all the story was very disjointed and lacked any kind of transition.
I rate this story a 2 out of 5, not because the story didn't show some promise. It did. It lacked flow and transition and left me feeling out of sorts.
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