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3.84 AVERAGE
3.84 AVERAGE
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
[2013] A real-life horror story. The author loses her husband, her two children, and her parents in the 2004 Sri Lanka tsunami. Deeply honest about her thoughts, behavior, and emotions during the years since - even when it didn't make her look so great, which I appreciated and allowed me to trust her. I feel that this was written less for an audience and more for herself and her recovery (a perfectly legit reason to write a book), so it read very personally. She offers up no answers or advice; it's not that kind of book. An accounting of the events, memories of each of the family members told in such a way that we get to know them just a little, and heartbreaking descriptions of the emotions she's felt throughout. There was not a lot of reflection or explanation on her unusual/unexpected behavior, especially in the immediate aftermath; maybe she felt none was needed (which I would understand) but it did leave me wondering. I was really moved by her description of what it was like going back to their home in London for the first time after four years. In there, she describes coming across one of the kid's rocks and their backpacks: "And the two red schoolbags, hanging on the door handle as always. I pick up the rock and press it tight into my palm. But I can't touch those schoolbags, each one now a scalpel." I also loved the memories she shared about how she and her husband met while they were in university twenty years before and their life early on.
Tremendous.
I thought this was going to be some factual analysis of the aftermath.
Instead, it is a love story.
A must read.
I thought this was going to be some factual analysis of the aftermath.
Instead, it is a love story.
A must read.
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
emotional
sad
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
This is the rawest memoir I’ve ever read - which makes sense! - and Deraniyagala manages to stick you into her feelings and pain completely. It was incredible. This memoir starts with the devastating 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. Deraniyagala is with her family - husband Steve, sons Vik and Malli, and her parents - on the beach in Yala, a resort trip during their visit home to Sri Lanka. The tsunami sweeps them all away. Derainyagala never sees any of them ever again.
This is a grief memoir, so buried in trauma and pain. It is hard to read. There are small threads of hope, but they are slow to appear, which again, makes sense after such a devastating loss. I cried over reading about her agonizing grief, and the way her trauma wouldn’t let her perform grief the way she thought she was supposed to do. But I cried more as I read about her slowly learning to be with the things her family left behind, and let their memories back in.
This is a grief memoir, so buried in trauma and pain. It is hard to read. There are small threads of hope, but they are slow to appear, which again, makes sense after such a devastating loss. I cried over reading about her agonizing grief, and the way her trauma wouldn’t let her perform grief the way she thought she was supposed to do. But I cried more as I read about her slowly learning to be with the things her family left behind, and let their memories back in.
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
emotional
reflective
medium-paced