Half the Kingdom by Lore Segal
My rating: 3/5 cats
a funny/melancholy little book about all those horrible things in life: estranged family, inability to communicate or connect, death, missed opportunities, feeling forgotten and neglected, the breaking down and betrayal of the body, bureaucracy and paperwork, loneliness, and hope—all that good, impossible, heartbreaking stuff.
but it can be startlingly funny, at times. many times
most of the story takes place in the emergency room of a hospital, which is fitting, as it is where we are most vulnerable, most exposed—whether we are there for ourselves or for a loved one. barriers come down, vanity is set aside, and everything is raw, exposed worry and fear and hopefulness.
at the cedars of lebanon hospital in manhattan, all of the elderly patients have suddenly presented with alzheimer’s, with more coming in all the time. could this be a new form of terrorist attack, or is it simply the strangest coincidence ever? the wide open eye come in to observe the phenomenon; a post 9-11 business comprised of eccentric academics, an elderly poet, and their bitter and resentful children, devoted to compiling the “compendium of end-of-world scenarios” which is exactly what it sounds like. is this an attack, or just the natural order of things, sped up a bit? they pepper the hospital’s emergency department, going undercover as patients, conducting interviews, observing the afflicted and their family members.
and that’s how the stories unfold.
this one is hard to pin down in a review—it is defying me a bit right now. it’s more a web of memories, monologues, old complaints and grievances, than any traditional narrative. it’s a little bit kafka, a little bit ionesco, a little bit stream-of-consciousness at times.
it doesn’t have as much cohesion as i usually like, but in this case, where we are hearing the howl and chatter of post-millennial america, cohesion is not really necessary. it’s just good, sad, redeeming stuff.
and that’s all i feel like telling you.
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