Amy P. Knight

Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett

As I suppose I’d come to expect from Haslett, this is a searing portrait of mental illness and its action on family, especially father-son relationships. Here it’s a family’s struggle to take care of Michael, the oldest son who has always been odd, and ill, after the suicide of John, the father, who was also mentally ill but existed much more in episodes.

It uses points of view from everyone, as both the siblings get jobs and partners, as Michael continues his destructive behavior. It feels more like an accurate record of the sort of experience such a family might have than an insight into human emotion — well done, but stopping there.

Maybe that isn’t fair — the children both cursed forever with this need to take care — but I never felt it transcend.

I’m Just a Person by Tig Nataro

Short and fun enough for vacation–but the whole thing really just kind of felt like she got a book deal because of her one lightning-in-a-bottle performance, and didn’t actually have anything to say. At least not yet. She wrote well about her mother but it didn’t feel fully considered–and the whole compressed into a narrative that didn’t have a natural shape.

The Pickup by Nadine Gordimer

Well this was wonderful. Unobtrusive and beautifully executed with gorgeous moments and a permeating understanding of flaws people have, without ever judging them or implying she’s any better.

Julie Summers, late 20s wishfully bohemian daughter of a wealthy white man in South Africa, member of a group of friends at “The Table” in the El-Ay Cafe. She meets her “Arab Prince” when her car breaks down–and they stay together for mysterious and wrong reasons. The surprising/inevitable ending. Exactly my sort of book.