by Rachel Khong
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Published: 2017
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Genre: Contemporary, Humor
Hardback: 208
Rating: 4
First sentence(s):
Tonight a man found Dad's pants in a tree lit with Christmas lights.
Her life at a crossroads, a young woman goes home again in this funny and inescapably moving debut from a wonderfully original new literary voice.
Freshly disengaged from her fiancé and feeling that life has not turned out quite the way she planned, thirty-year-old Ruth quits her job, leaves town and arrives at her parents’ home to find that situation more complicated than she'd realized. Her father, a prominent history professor, is losing his memory and is only erratically lucid. Ruth’s mother, meanwhile, is lucidly erratic. But as Ruth's father’s condition intensifies, the comedy in her situation takes hold, gently transforming her all her grief.
Told in captivating glimpses and drawn from a deep well of insight, humor, and unexpected tenderness, Goodbye, Vitamin pilots through the loss, love, and absurdity of finding one’s footing in this life.
My two-bits:
This is a humorous, yet serious perspective of a young adult in a caregiver role for a father experiencing the early stages of Alzheimer's. The gradual transition of the relationship between father and daughter is also presented by way of short observations of daily living.
* part of Tournament of Books 2018 (here)
