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A review by karieh13
Our Short History by Lauren Grodstein
3.0
“In the dark, from her hiding space under the pillow, Allie squeezed my hand, and the old platinum ring on my thumb, and we fell asleep pondering the condition of being mothers, which was, of course, the condition of helping the people you love the most in the world leave you.”
Karen, the main character of “Our Short Story” – is a mother. Her son, Jake, will not have the chance to grow up and leave her, because she is dying. She must leave him, and she writes her story, and their too short story, in order to give him a chance to know her once she is gone. This is a heartbreaking book, about the intensity of a mother’s love, and about a woman trying to do everything she can to prepare to leave the world and everything she holds dear.
She has Stage 4 ovarian cancer, and an undefined but short time to live. A single mother, she is doing all she can to ready her son for a new life without her while fiercely trying to wring out every last experience and memory of her own life. She has planned for Jake to live with her sister Allie, in Seattle…until Jake’s father enters the picture again and she is forced to deal with the unexpected feelings not only of hers, but of Jake’s and the man who never knew he was a father.
There is so much pain in this story – some physical, mostly emotional. As a mother myself, it was impossible for me to not imagine myself in Karen’s place – desperate to stay with a child you love more than life itself while having to plan for your child’s life after you’re gone. The reader experiences Karen’s frustration, exhaustion, denial and final the start to her release & acceptance.
The story starts out about her but evolves into the story of Jake – where his life will lead and how he will grow up with the people Karen has gathered to help raise him. What Jake’s memories and stories will be about the woman who bore him and raised him in the time she had on Earth.
She has done her best for him, and realizes she needs to trust in the other people who love him. “I hope that wherever and whenever this book finds you, it finds you as happy as you were at that moment – as the two of us were, the three of us, even. Eating pizza around the kitchen table, no big deal, a Thursday night. Remember that we loved each other. And that once upon a time it was the two of us, and we were our own magical family.”
As Karen starts to let go, the reader must as well – not with the ending anyone wanted, but with an ending where it belongs – at peace. In the end, it is not about the life that Karen has given her son, but what his life has given her. “And thank you for being eternal, so that when the time comes – whenever it comes – I will find the strength to close my eyes.”
Karen, the main character of “Our Short Story” – is a mother. Her son, Jake, will not have the chance to grow up and leave her, because she is dying. She must leave him, and she writes her story, and their too short story, in order to give him a chance to know her once she is gone. This is a heartbreaking book, about the intensity of a mother’s love, and about a woman trying to do everything she can to prepare to leave the world and everything she holds dear.
She has Stage 4 ovarian cancer, and an undefined but short time to live. A single mother, she is doing all she can to ready her son for a new life without her while fiercely trying to wring out every last experience and memory of her own life. She has planned for Jake to live with her sister Allie, in Seattle…until Jake’s father enters the picture again and she is forced to deal with the unexpected feelings not only of hers, but of Jake’s and the man who never knew he was a father.
There is so much pain in this story – some physical, mostly emotional. As a mother myself, it was impossible for me to not imagine myself in Karen’s place – desperate to stay with a child you love more than life itself while having to plan for your child’s life after you’re gone. The reader experiences Karen’s frustration, exhaustion, denial and final the start to her release & acceptance.
The story starts out about her but evolves into the story of Jake – where his life will lead and how he will grow up with the people Karen has gathered to help raise him. What Jake’s memories and stories will be about the woman who bore him and raised him in the time she had on Earth.
She has done her best for him, and realizes she needs to trust in the other people who love him. “I hope that wherever and whenever this book finds you, it finds you as happy as you were at that moment – as the two of us were, the three of us, even. Eating pizza around the kitchen table, no big deal, a Thursday night. Remember that we loved each other. And that once upon a time it was the two of us, and we were our own magical family.”
As Karen starts to let go, the reader must as well – not with the ending anyone wanted, but with an ending where it belongs – at peace. In the end, it is not about the life that Karen has given her son, but what his life has given her. “And thank you for being eternal, so that when the time comes – whenever it comes – I will find the strength to close my eyes.”