Reviews

The Tenderness of Stones by Geoffrey Brock, Marion Fayolle

smay's review

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

3.5

Interesting art and approach to a story about grief. I liked the author's honesty about the bad times and the imagery she chose to illustrate the illness and death of her father.

gfox3737's review against another edition

4.0

A surreal fable about a dying father. Rough and inventive with illustrations that remind me of old airplane emergency comics.

bluepigeon's review

5.0

An incisive examination of the complex relationship with a father who's dying. Marion Fayolle's The Tenderness of Stones beautifully and painstakingly explores the various interlocking stages of having a loved one with terminal illness. Grief is a complex beast made even more intricately nuanced by the fact that before the illness, for a whole lifetime, the relationship between father and daughter was problematic. Described as an absent and distant father who rarely used his words and who was perhaps an alcoholic, the terminally ill man who is slowly being resected and rearranged by the medical machine becomes the dependent child who needs constant care and attention and who shows no gratitude for the efforts of the family. The mother plays mother, now to her own husband. allowing the grown children to escape her attentions, only to return to desperately try to hang on to the dying man, still seeking his approval and his love, still getting hurt by the lack of it. Some of the metaphorical descriptions work really well for the story and are rendered in loving, detailed, crosshatched attention and expertise.

Highly recommended for everyone who has loved (or unloved) ones, because we will one day all be either taking care of them or being taking care of by them. Also recommended for those who like cats, plants and family trees.